The clean buildings above ground were what most people saw - if they ever got that close. The Moebius facility stretched out for quite a ways, much of it open land. In the center, there were the administration buildings, the Academy, and the dorms. Plenty of room for students and teachers, with additional on-campus habitation for the few Aberrant families in existence.
That's what most people saw, at least.
The truth of the matter, though, was that it was only the tip of the iceberg. For every shiny white building aboveground, there were three times as many structures below. Corridors, chambers, and security systems every step of the way. Underneath the academy was the real operation.
This was where the Moebius Facility interacted with United States Intelligence, where field operatives were briefed, debriefed, and supplied for their missions. This was, in short, where everything took place that was meant to stay out of public eye - even from those in the aboveground complex.
The deepest levels held rows of soundproof interrogation rooms and detention centers. As was the case with any overly-complex facility, the government spared no expense.
Naturally, such chambers were never used.
Or rather, they weren't used for their original purpose. Knowing full-well that the interrogation facilities would be used rarely if at all, Director Pryce granted usage of most of the chambers to active field-agents. Such rooms were useful for training and meditation, while a few of the larger rooms were refitted for general sparring practice.
The elevator doors opened on this bottom level, and a lithe woman stepped out. She looked around for a second, and then went down the hallway to the smaller rooms.
The room at the end of the corridor had the "Occupied" light on red, which meant that someone was using that room. The woman ignored the light and opened the door. She was met by a soft voice, singing quietly to itself. The woman smiled and continued into the room.
Inside, facing away from the door, was a slightly smaller woman; the source of the singing. A music stand was in front of her, with a songbook opened up to something that the taller woman couldn't identify. The singing woman didn't turn around, having not heard the door open. She continued with her soft melody.
The taller woman crept up behind her, a mischievous grin on her face. She reached out and tapped her on the shoulder--
--and was rewarded by a loud, startled shriek. The smaller woman spun around and raised her hands defensively, but put them back down when she saw the identity of her assailant.
She raised her hands again and started forming signs. "[Oh,]" she signed. "[It's just you.]"
"Just me?" the taller woman said, snickering. "Come on, Jillian, I thought you liked me better than that."
"[Keep dreaming,]" Jillian responded, rolling her eyes. She glanced back at the new pile of shattered wood. "[That's three music stands you owe me now, b*****d.]"
"Hey," the woman cried, defensively. "
You're the one who broke them, banshee."
"[And you're the one who startled me, drag queen.]" Jillian sighed. "[What do you want?]"
The woman staggered back dramatically, clutching a hand to her heart. "Why Jillian Carver, you wound me so! To imply that I only come to talk to you when I need something."
Jillian glared as she repeated herself, slower and more forcefully. "[What do you want?]"
The woman sighed. "No sense of humor. It pains me, Jillian."
She dug into her pocket and pulled out a pair of identification cards. "Help me pick one."
Jillian looked at them both. "[Why do you need two fake identities for your alternate form? Isn't one enough?]"
"No," came the reply. "Arienne Reilly is well enough for all of you guys to call me, but the other's for when I just want to drop off the radar." She flipped the second card over and studied it. "According to Pryce, Allison Roberts is a mid-level employee for the government. Works in IT. Has a studio apartment in Orlando, two cats, doesn't get out much except for business-related trips." She glanced up directly into Jillian's eyes. "According to the government, she doesn't exist. Perfect for a cover."
"[So why are you asking me?]"
"Because I like you?" the woman answered. "Because you're my friend, and I trust your opinion. I like to get as many perspectives as I can on this sort of thing, you know."
Jillian lifted an eyebrow quizzically. "[Perspective?]"
"Yes, perspective. Who should I go as?"
Jillian sighed. "[If you want my honest opinion, then I think you should go as yourself. But if you really can't bring yourself to, then go as the closest thing.]" She pointed to Arienne's identification. "[That's the name you picked for yourself when you first manifested, isn't it?]"
Arienne nodded. "Yeah. The thing is, though, that I really
can't go as myself."
"[Why not?]"
"What?"
"[Why not?]" Jillian repeated. "[Isn't that why you're going there in the first place?]"
Arienne winced. "Well...yeah. But I have no idea who these people really
are. I don't know how they'd react to me. So I think it would be best if I go once as someone else first, to get a feel for their personalities. See how they react to an Aberrant."
Jillian stayed silent as she pondered this. "[You have a point, yes. But when you went to rescue your mother, on the trip back, didn't she say that we should never judge a book by its cover?]" She glanced down at the pile of splintered wood, formerly known as her music stand. "[Which is why we shouldn't judge a person by the presence or lack of Aberrant abilities?]"
The silent girl pressed on. "[You've met the woman before. You know her position on the Aberrant issue. I think the others will be of a similar opinion.]"
Arienne nodded. "No, I get that. It's just...I'm scared."
Jillian thought for a second. "[Stay with what you know,]" she signed, indicating the first card. "[Get a feel for them first before revealing yourself, but there's no need to use a completely new identity for them.]"
Arienne nodded and put away the ID cards.
"[When are you leaving?]" Jillian asked.
"Tomorrow," Arienne replied, "early morning. I've got a brief layover in Memphis, but I should be at O'Hare before noon. Hammond still won't grant me authorization to rent a car--"
"[After what you did with the last one?]"
"Hush. I had a good reason to do that."
Jillian stared. "[You crashed it into a house.]"
Arienne waved off the accusation. "It was a small house."
"[It had people in it at the time.]"
"They were reimbursed for the damage," Arienne noted. "Out of my own paycheck, might I add, even though I did what I did to complete the mission."
"[Never drive me anywhere.]"
"Oh ye of little faith."
* * *
"...so your father and I will be picking her up at the airport."
Kelly frowned. "I still don't understand why you've got a random Aberrant coming up here for the week, Mom."
"Yeah," James added. "Aberrants are dumb. Don't bring one here."
Laura Reilly ignored her son's outburst and focused on her eldest daughter's concern. "The same reason you're staying here for the week. I invited her, she needs a place to stay, and I offered."
Kelly frowned. "You said she was Section Three, right?"
"Right."
"Isn't that a non-existence department of Intelligence?" Kelly asked. "Cloak and dagger stuff? How did you meet her?"
Laura sighed. "She's the one who rescued me when I was captured about five years ago. She and I have kept in contact since then, and I invited her here for the end of my campaign."
Her daughter shook her head. "You wanting to run for Senator was the reason you were captured in the
first place, Mom. What's to say someone won't try to get rid of you again?"
Laura smiled. "That's the main reason Pryce agreed to this. Having a powerful Aberrant around will be good protection in case someone tries to make a move."
Kelly turned away and looked out the window. "I still don't like this. You're taking a huge risk."
"No," Laura responded. "If I have a chance to be a thorn in the side of both extremes, I'm going to take it." She gathered up her coat and walked to the door. "We'll be back in an hour or two, and you can meet her yourself. That should make you feel better about this.
With that, she walked out the door to the waiting car.
"I really don't like this," Kelly murmured, watching her parents drive off. "She's going to get herself hurt again."
"Stupid Aberrants," James remarked. "They're all useless."
"I don't know," Jenny said, entering the room. "There's a boy in my class? He's a Gamma."
"Yeah, and I bet he's as much trouble as every other one," her brother snarled.
Jenny waggled an eyebrow. "He can do the most
amazing thing with his tongue..."
Kelly turned back from the window. "Oh God! I don't want to hear that!"
Jenny's eyes went wide and innocent. "What? He can make shapes with it. He made a monkey for me yesterday, and--"
Her words were cut off as she dodged a book that was thrown in her direction. "Hey, don't get mad at me," she protested, "you're the one who took an innocent comment and ran with it."
"You're evil."
"You know it."
Jenny picked up the book and handed it back to her sister. "So why do you think Mom likes this chick so much? I mean, I'm grateful to her too, for saving her from whatshisface--"
"Tauros."
"Thank you. But I don't know the woman, and I don't trust the whole Aberrant program. The government has a heavy hand in it, and I don't like that."
Kelly sighed. "Then do what Mom's doing - risk your life to change the world."
Jenny sat down on a nearby couch. "I still don't like it."
"Neither do I. But at this point, what can we do?"
* * *
"I'm not certain that we
should be doing anything."
Jillian crossed her arms and glared at the swirling mass of darkness. "This is Kevin," she said. Her powers could not hurt the incorporeal Gendou, which was why she felt comfortable enough to actually speak in his presence. "Our friend."
The shadowy mass swept around her; Jillian turned to keep facing it. "Indeed," it said, in a low voice. "Our friend. This makes me wonder why you're so against his trip."
Jillian placed her hands on her hips, angrily. "I'm not against the trip, I'm against his behavior! This is his first chance to actually reconnect with his family, and he's messing it up! Genny, why can't you see that?"
The shadow opened a pair of glowing red eyes. "I understand your point completely. But this is his family, is it not?"
"...yes..."
Gendou continued. "And he is an adult, correct?"
Jillian snorted. "Not mentally."
"Regardless."
She sighed. "Yes."
Gendou's eyes blinked. "Then I don't see how this concerns the rest of us."
"It seems to me that you're projecting your own family troubles onto him," a woman's voice said from just outside.
Jillian narrowed her eyes. "I'm sorry?"
Rene entered the room and slouched up against a wall. "You went back to Houston about six years ago, right? To go visit your family? Do you remember how that went?"
Jillian's face fell. "[They...didn't take it too well.]"
"By the time the extraction team got there, you had accidentally leveled a neighboring house." Rene crossed her arms. "Your family didn't accept you back, you freaked, and hell broke loose. And you know that they'll never let you back there again."
Jillian's face colored, and her eyes filled with tears as she remembered the incident. "[They...didn't want me back even before.]"
"Exactly," Rene said. "But that doesn't change the fact that you still blame yourself. You blame yourself for losing control, you blame yourself for your personality, and you blame yourself for existing."
"What?" Jillian clamped her hands over her mouth as she vocalized her shocked outburst. She brought her hands back down and repeated herself. "[What?]"
"Don't deny it," Rene said. "You were heartbroken about it for months, and it took a long time for you be able to face Hammond again."
"[He was angry.]"
"He was angry because he had to give a report to Pryce, how his star Sonic Alpha caused over a million dollars' worth of property damage when visiting her family." Rene narrowed her eyes. "And you don't need to bother with the sign-language crap. You haven't lost real control of your powers in about four years. I think I'm safe."
Jillian was silent for a moment. "He...I couldn't look him in the eyes until December that year."
"But you confused the reasons for his exasperation," Gendou interjected. "He never mentioned that allowing you back was a mistake. He was actually fairly sympathetic towards that incident. You keep thinking that he blamed you, and you'll only give yourself justification to blame yourself."
"Which is why you aren't comfortable with Kevin's own trip," Rene finished. "You think that he's going to do what you did, and then he'll be without his family, just like you."
"No, I--" Jillian protested.
"No, you do." Rene stood up straight and walked up to the shorter girl. "You want to spare him the pain of failure, and that's very sweet of you. But Kevin knows what he's doing...sometimes. And if he's going to make a mistake - which I don't think he is - he has to be able to make them on his own. You can't protect him from his own stupidity."
"If we were responsible for his stupidity," Gendou said, airily, "we wouldn't have any free time at all."
Jillian giggled at that. "I still worry," she said, after composing herself.
"As you should, when Kevin's involved." Rene ran her hand through her blue-dyed hair. "But sometimes you should just let it go."
* * *
The children in front of Arienne continued to scream. "I said let it go!"
Arienne sighed. Those two children had been fighting during the entire flight - two hours, nonstop - and even at the baggage claim, they were relentless. Their mother seemed to either not notice the effect that her spawn were having on those around them, or she simply didn't care.
Arienne figured that she'd probably care if her precious darlings were wrapped with six-inch vines. She didn't get the chance to test this theory out, however, as her bags arrived at that moment. Picking them up with a minimum of staggering - cursing the physics of her bodyshift - she made her way to the gate.
Halfway to the doors, she stumbled, dropping her luggage on the ground.
"Great," she muttered, bending over to retrieve her fallen bags. "Just what I need."
A man rushed over to help her. She glared him away. Honestly, what was so wrong with her body that the transformation needed to pull part of her muscle mass away? She was far from helpless in this form, but the difference of strength between Arienne and Kevin was one that she always hated.
Doctor Zendrake explained it to her once - something about the "compensation of mass", and "shifting centers of gravity", and other quick statements about female anatomy.
It was cliche, yes, and even stereotypical, but that's the way it was. Very much a pain sometimes, but most often, she didn't dwell too much on it.
She stepped outside the terminal, on the lower deck for Arrivals; looking around, she spotted a familiar face stepping out of a red SUV, and headed in that direction. She took a deep breath of the sweet morning air; tinged with just a hint of gas and cooking meat. She was home. After nearly twenty years.
She was home.
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