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xp_logs2010-09-03 10:55 am
x-scarletwitch.livejournal.com) wrote in xp_logs2010-09-03 10:55 am
Operation: Lie Back and Think of England: Evidence
Emma, Sarah and Wanda go undercover to secure the evidence they need - proving that 'security' is less an obstacle and more an exercise in 'creative thinking'.
The medical research building in Leicester looked as futuristic as the nearby National Space Centre. However, where the one was soaring curves and light, Agria was dark and closed; the dark stone and tinted glass offering nothing, like a three story monolith without answers. They had seen it on their arrival, from the initial public disclosure of Bennett's interests. Now it seemed more significant.
Wanda hated nothing more than atmosphere that was willing to lend itself quite so willingly to an already tense situation. Standing casually with Emma and Sarah, she glanced back down at the papers in her hands that detailed who she was at the moment and all the necessary and fun pieces that came with a cover identity. "Well?" she asked. "Do we play nice or play rough?"
She rather hoped they started with 'nice', it would make entry into the building much easier.
"It's England, dear Wanda," replied Emma. "I believe nice is obligatory." Emma waved a hand at herself. "I'd also like to save the Burberry from getting trashed if possible. It's next season and I'd like to have something left of it by the time next season actually arrives."
Sarah snorted. "Can't you just pay them to make more? It's not like you couldn't get them to make you your own damn collection."
"I don't think that's really the point," Wanda chimed in as she held out two freshly made ID cards to the others. She'd let Emma do the talking, as it were, to get them inside but they had come prepared in case they attempted to do the easy way first. ID's and paperwork that would resonate as real no matter how far they looked.
Emma looked at the picture on her ID critically. "I do hope Monsieur LeBeau is at least vaguely cognisant of the level of sacrifice this mission entails," she said and, once again, touched a hand to the ends of her hair in a vaguely protective gesture, the slim paleness of her hands startling against the now stunning-black cascade. "I'm going to have to pay Sebastian extra if I'm going to be blonde again by morning." She sighed and flipped shut the ID and papers, tucking them into the slim leather case she was carrying. "Are we ready, ladies?"
"Ready as we ever are," Wanda said, clipping her own badge onto the front of her suit jacket as the trio started for the door. Thankfully being under the radar in the kind of circles that Emma ran in, she hadn't had to do anything quite so dramatic with her appearance. Several hours had gone into pulling it into a non-wavey, strict looking bun that made her look older and more pinched in the face, subtle ways of looking different.
"I'm going to take these heels and gouge Remy's eyes out with them." Sarah grumbled, following closely behind Emma and Wanda, her ID tucked into the pocket of her pants. "After we sweet-talk some answers out of these guys."
They had timed their entry into Agria quite precisely. The public entrance was still open, but only just; Emma didn't need her telepathy to sense the frustration of the security guard as he had to change his plans to lock the doors to the public to a grudging holding of the door to admit them. With barely a murmured thanks to the man, Emma made her way to the reception desk, hiding her internal amusement at the obvious despair of the receptionist who so clearly had been planning to go home, right now. Emma didn't even let the girl launch into her "the office is closed" spiel before she had her ID out and on the table.
"My name is Emily Devereaux," said Emma. "Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Authority. We have an appointment with your Chief Research Officer, Dr. Williams." Emma liked companies that used standard software for their lower-end administrative tasks; creating spurious appointments was something Doug could do in his sleep. Even as she watched the receptionist start the phone call/visitor's pass/signing in process, Emma casually rummaged through the girl's mind, finding nothing of interest. If Agria was doing something nefarious, the receptionist had no inkling of it.
#Such a shame to destroy every conspiracy theorist's trope, but if there's a conspiracy to take down the government, it doesn't stretch as far as the receptionist.# Emma's report into Wanda and Sarah's mind was delivered in her usual dryly amused mental tone.
#They never make it easy on us,# came Wanda's floating thought back to Emma and, through her, Sarah. When the secretary found them, she still hesitated as if the thought of a visit so close to closing time would actually be a hurdled.
In a nasal and loud voice unlike her own, Wanda snapped out, "Do you not see who we are, girl? If we're forced to go back to the MHRA and tell them that we were turned back from the door simply due to the fact that someone -from your organization - mistimed our appointment, it will certainly not look favorably on anyone here. Yourself included."
The girl swallowed and offered to show them the way herself.
Sarah smiled sweetly at the receptionist, an action that would have been unsettling to anyone who knew her in real life. "We appreciate you taking charge here. And the incompetence of your coworkers has been noted."
"Dr Williams is a busy man," said Emma, her tones soothing, her best good cop impersonation. "He specifically requested a late appointment to ensure we didn't interfere with his usual tasks. If you could just escort us to his office, that would be most appreciated."
The receptionist's combined irritation and sullen fear spilled through Emma's mind as the girl escorted them to Dr Williams' office, barely mollified by Emma's polite chit-chat. One advantage of strong emotions that Emma had found, however, was they tended to allow easier access to minds, and Emma used that access to swiftly work on the receptionist's mind. Neatly Emma twisted current memories into a neat parcel, then sent the girl back to her desk with a telepathic command implanted next to them. By the time the girl got back to her desk, her memories of the appointment would be as neatly erased as the notice of it in her calendar.
Dr Williams, when he let them in, proved as Welsh as his name, pale skin contrasting against dark hair, his accent soft as they introduced themselves and the spurious vaccine reaction reports for various Agria products that were their cover story. But when Emma probed the mind behind the gentle-looking exterior, the contrast was clear.
#Ladies,# she sent to Wanda and Sarah. #Dr William is up to his neck in something bad. He's got some rudimentary shields around some of it. Nothing professional, just natural caution by the feel of it. Give me a couple of minutes and I should be able to dig up the worst of it. Would you like to stay and watch? Or would you prefer I provide some telepathic cover, so you can go out and explore?#
#Normally, I'd be against splitting our forces with unknown elements about,# Wanda responded thoughtfully, #but I think it may be best in this situation. A little telepathic cover will mean our exit certainly will be missed - or, perhaps, our presence not even remembered.#
She glanced over at Sarah and nodded towards the door, eyebrows raising in a silent question. Exploring would grant them the ability to search and drastically cut down on the time they were forced to be in the building. And that was something Wanda was certainly all for.
Sarah pushed herself up out of her chair, not quickly, but imagining herself blending in with her surroundings as anyone else in the room looked right past her and to the gaudy wallpaper of the office. It seriously fucked with her head they they could actually do this. When they were through the door, Sarah looked over at Wanda, and realized she was holding her breath. "Where to?"
The other woman breathed a quiet breath as the door shut firmly behind them, muffling noise from inside and from out. From an inner pocket, Wanda pulled out a small copy of the blueprints for the building. She glanced around and then back down at the paper in her hand, mentally noting where they were leaving Emma. "Where else?" she asked with a sharp smile. "Where they don't want us being, of course."
Sarah chuckled. "Could you be more specific? I get the feeling they don't want us anywhere." She held out her hands as if weighing possibilities. "Do we go looking for the paperwork or the labs?"
Wanda tapped the map against her hand as she gave it a quick thought. "Paperwork first," she said slowly. "The paperwork will, I think, make looking for the rest easier if we can find it." She went still as she carefully, for she knew she had a loud mental voice and was always very conscious of projecting, sent that thought to Emma. No sense in them wondering about without her knowing where they went.
#Give me a second,# sent back Emma and, while maintaining a conversation about adverse reactions to a flu vaccine Agria was manufacturing, took the opportunity to gently sidle her mind past some of the outer layers of Dr Williams' natural shielding. #I don't think there's much on computer. There's a records section somewhere. With security cabinets, locked. Safe locks. And drawers behind drawers.# Emma delved a touch further and then used the link to send a quick mental map to Wanda and Sarah, a room highlighted in yellow. #Try there,# she said and then closed the link down to a cobweb-thin thread of consciousness. Dr Williams was a fast talker and efficient about dealing with the reports. Emma was going to have to concentrate to keep this conversation going for long enough to let Wanda and Sarah do their thing.
"This looks like it." Sarah pointed at the door, the only door in the entire building without a nameplate label. Maybe they thought 'Keep out' was too obvious. "You think they've got it rigged to set off the alarm if you just turn the handle?"
"They do," Wanda replied with just a casual glance at the door. Strong red strings branched on in a number of directions from the door itself and several from the handle. However, there were one or two possibilities that wouldn't bring the house down around their ears. So to speak. A tweak there and the system suddenly ... hiccuped, reacting as if someone with an authorized keycard had swiped it through.
Seeing a window of opportunity that wouldn't last long, Wanda quickly opened the door and shuffled both Sarah and herself in.
Inside was a wall of filing cabinets, no doubt meticulously organized, just like Emma had promised. "I don't suppose anything's filed 'For company eyes only'?
"Let's ask, shall we?" As she started towards the filing cabinets, unable to shake the claustrophobic feeling that crowded in once the door had closed behind them, Wanda carefully sent out a thread of thought.
#Emma? By chance does Dr. Williams happen to have a favorite filing cabinet or two?#
#It's a security cabinet,# responded Emma, flashing a quick picture of a dull grey, obviously heavy filing cabinet with a safe combination lock on the front of it. #Let me look deeper.# Emma closed down the thread for a moment, concentrating all her power into Dr Williams' mind, past the (she was pleased to note) dull matters of regulatory compliance that filled his conscious mind, slipping again past the anxious caution that hid whatever Agria was doing. She rummaged lightly amongst the memories and found what she was looking for. #It's against the back wall. Third from the left. There's a false drawer behind the real drawers.# Emma made a noise down the telepathic thread that could best be described as a snort. #It's red and flashing with danger signs in his head. I think Dr Williams might be more than a little worried about what's in that cabinet.#
Wanda and Sarah quickly located the cabinet in question - if not for Emma's ability to peel back the layers of Dr. Williams like an onion, they would have wasted precious time (and a lot of it) trying to locate the right one. Jennie's power was luck based, Wanda had to rely on other things to make her own luck. "We'll probably need to pull out a few of these drawers to get to the false one," she said quietly, putting thought to action as she yanked the first one free of it's rollers.
The heavy drawer clattered as it came free, and Sarah winced. "Sneaky, we are not." She grabbed another drawer and pulled it free in the same manner as Wanda had, peeking her head inside the space it left behind. She pulled on a lever hidden in what seemed like the back of the cabinet, and it pulled loose easily. Coming out slowly from the space between the drawers, she muttered, "Hello hidden drawer, we've been looking for you."
"Normally I'd see what we'd found but we still have one more place to cover before we can hightail it out of here." Wanda carefully reached into the drawer that Sarah had pulled free and brought out a sheaf of papers that had been loosely bound together. Popping open her suit jacket allowed her to ruck up the back of her shirt so she could slip it between her waist and her pants before tucking everything back in.
"We'll take a look at the papers once we're safely in the labs with the doors locked behind us."
"Just don't sweat all over them," Sarah grinned, and returned the file drawers to their original position. If they were really lucky, the company might not even realize the papers were gone before they had figured out what they needed from them. She opened the door out into the hallway, and gestured Wanda out of the room. "To the labs?"
Wanda had looked faintly outraged at the idea that she might sweat all over the papers but she waved a hand half-regally as they headed towards the doors. "Once we're in, we'll look through the paperwork and find what we need." She was projecting in Emma's direction, letting them know where they were going. "Let's just hope Emma's not having any trouble with our boy."
#If you could move quickly, that would be most appreciated,# Emma sent back softly down the link. #I've taken nearly as much time as I can over this paperwork. If the search goes on much longer, I'm going to have to start seducing him Let's just say that I would prefer that does not become necessary.#
Wanda made a face at that as she turned back to Sarah. "How fast do you think we can run to the labs without attracting attention, then?"
"Just look like you're about to miss a meeting. I doubt that's something they even notice around here." And with that, she began to stride purposefully down the hallway, with as wide of strides as her legs would allow.
By virtue of having done this exact walk so many times in her life that she had long ago lost track, Wanda pulled ahead slightly. "The labs we want are, of course, downstairs," she commented over her shoulder, voice pitched so as not to carry to anyone who might be near by. "If we want to keep this charade as PG-13 as possible, I'll try to blow through whatever security systems we encounter." She snorted. "That might bring more local guards running, though."
It was always hard to tell with her abilities but the labs would probably be more secure than the filing room they had just been in.
They arrived at the end of the hallway without incident, and as they reached the door to the stairwell the security scan sparked and popped, the view screen flashing "Initializing" as the unit reset itself from the sudden power surge. Sarah followed Wanda through the now unlocked door, and hurried behind her as they made their way down the stairs. "I don't suppose that can be the only thing we run across before we get to the labs..."
"Probably not and, truth be told, some of these security 'blips' are sure to be noticed sooner than later." With them through one set of doors, Wanda had fished out the files and had started flipping through them in order to try and get a sense of what they needed to find. "Let's hope that we're at the lab by the time that happens."
The pair slowed as they hit the bottom of the stairs and found themselves confronted with yet another door. A touch in their minds informed them that the labs were being watched over by a few guards. If they hadn't already known something was up, armed guards were certainly a very large clue.
Wanda carefully tucked the papers back under her jacket where they wouldn't get damaged and then shared a smile with Sarah. "Let's say hello, shall we?"
The medical research building in Leicester looked as futuristic as the nearby National Space Centre. However, where the one was soaring curves and light, Agria was dark and closed; the dark stone and tinted glass offering nothing, like a three story monolith without answers. They had seen it on their arrival, from the initial public disclosure of Bennett's interests. Now it seemed more significant.
Wanda hated nothing more than atmosphere that was willing to lend itself quite so willingly to an already tense situation. Standing casually with Emma and Sarah, she glanced back down at the papers in her hands that detailed who she was at the moment and all the necessary and fun pieces that came with a cover identity. "Well?" she asked. "Do we play nice or play rough?"
She rather hoped they started with 'nice', it would make entry into the building much easier.
"It's England, dear Wanda," replied Emma. "I believe nice is obligatory." Emma waved a hand at herself. "I'd also like to save the Burberry from getting trashed if possible. It's next season and I'd like to have something left of it by the time next season actually arrives."
Sarah snorted. "Can't you just pay them to make more? It's not like you couldn't get them to make you your own damn collection."
"I don't think that's really the point," Wanda chimed in as she held out two freshly made ID cards to the others. She'd let Emma do the talking, as it were, to get them inside but they had come prepared in case they attempted to do the easy way first. ID's and paperwork that would resonate as real no matter how far they looked.
Emma looked at the picture on her ID critically. "I do hope Monsieur LeBeau is at least vaguely cognisant of the level of sacrifice this mission entails," she said and, once again, touched a hand to the ends of her hair in a vaguely protective gesture, the slim paleness of her hands startling against the now stunning-black cascade. "I'm going to have to pay Sebastian extra if I'm going to be blonde again by morning." She sighed and flipped shut the ID and papers, tucking them into the slim leather case she was carrying. "Are we ready, ladies?"
"Ready as we ever are," Wanda said, clipping her own badge onto the front of her suit jacket as the trio started for the door. Thankfully being under the radar in the kind of circles that Emma ran in, she hadn't had to do anything quite so dramatic with her appearance. Several hours had gone into pulling it into a non-wavey, strict looking bun that made her look older and more pinched in the face, subtle ways of looking different.
"I'm going to take these heels and gouge Remy's eyes out with them." Sarah grumbled, following closely behind Emma and Wanda, her ID tucked into the pocket of her pants. "After we sweet-talk some answers out of these guys."
They had timed their entry into Agria quite precisely. The public entrance was still open, but only just; Emma didn't need her telepathy to sense the frustration of the security guard as he had to change his plans to lock the doors to the public to a grudging holding of the door to admit them. With barely a murmured thanks to the man, Emma made her way to the reception desk, hiding her internal amusement at the obvious despair of the receptionist who so clearly had been planning to go home, right now. Emma didn't even let the girl launch into her "the office is closed" spiel before she had her ID out and on the table.
"My name is Emily Devereaux," said Emma. "Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Authority. We have an appointment with your Chief Research Officer, Dr. Williams." Emma liked companies that used standard software for their lower-end administrative tasks; creating spurious appointments was something Doug could do in his sleep. Even as she watched the receptionist start the phone call/visitor's pass/signing in process, Emma casually rummaged through the girl's mind, finding nothing of interest. If Agria was doing something nefarious, the receptionist had no inkling of it.
#Such a shame to destroy every conspiracy theorist's trope, but if there's a conspiracy to take down the government, it doesn't stretch as far as the receptionist.# Emma's report into Wanda and Sarah's mind was delivered in her usual dryly amused mental tone.
#They never make it easy on us,# came Wanda's floating thought back to Emma and, through her, Sarah. When the secretary found them, she still hesitated as if the thought of a visit so close to closing time would actually be a hurdled.
In a nasal and loud voice unlike her own, Wanda snapped out, "Do you not see who we are, girl? If we're forced to go back to the MHRA and tell them that we were turned back from the door simply due to the fact that someone -from your organization - mistimed our appointment, it will certainly not look favorably on anyone here. Yourself included."
The girl swallowed and offered to show them the way herself.
Sarah smiled sweetly at the receptionist, an action that would have been unsettling to anyone who knew her in real life. "We appreciate you taking charge here. And the incompetence of your coworkers has been noted."
"Dr Williams is a busy man," said Emma, her tones soothing, her best good cop impersonation. "He specifically requested a late appointment to ensure we didn't interfere with his usual tasks. If you could just escort us to his office, that would be most appreciated."
The receptionist's combined irritation and sullen fear spilled through Emma's mind as the girl escorted them to Dr Williams' office, barely mollified by Emma's polite chit-chat. One advantage of strong emotions that Emma had found, however, was they tended to allow easier access to minds, and Emma used that access to swiftly work on the receptionist's mind. Neatly Emma twisted current memories into a neat parcel, then sent the girl back to her desk with a telepathic command implanted next to them. By the time the girl got back to her desk, her memories of the appointment would be as neatly erased as the notice of it in her calendar.
Dr Williams, when he let them in, proved as Welsh as his name, pale skin contrasting against dark hair, his accent soft as they introduced themselves and the spurious vaccine reaction reports for various Agria products that were their cover story. But when Emma probed the mind behind the gentle-looking exterior, the contrast was clear.
#Ladies,# she sent to Wanda and Sarah. #Dr William is up to his neck in something bad. He's got some rudimentary shields around some of it. Nothing professional, just natural caution by the feel of it. Give me a couple of minutes and I should be able to dig up the worst of it. Would you like to stay and watch? Or would you prefer I provide some telepathic cover, so you can go out and explore?#
#Normally, I'd be against splitting our forces with unknown elements about,# Wanda responded thoughtfully, #but I think it may be best in this situation. A little telepathic cover will mean our exit certainly will be missed - or, perhaps, our presence not even remembered.#
She glanced over at Sarah and nodded towards the door, eyebrows raising in a silent question. Exploring would grant them the ability to search and drastically cut down on the time they were forced to be in the building. And that was something Wanda was certainly all for.
Sarah pushed herself up out of her chair, not quickly, but imagining herself blending in with her surroundings as anyone else in the room looked right past her and to the gaudy wallpaper of the office. It seriously fucked with her head they they could actually do this. When they were through the door, Sarah looked over at Wanda, and realized she was holding her breath. "Where to?"
The other woman breathed a quiet breath as the door shut firmly behind them, muffling noise from inside and from out. From an inner pocket, Wanda pulled out a small copy of the blueprints for the building. She glanced around and then back down at the paper in her hand, mentally noting where they were leaving Emma. "Where else?" she asked with a sharp smile. "Where they don't want us being, of course."
Sarah chuckled. "Could you be more specific? I get the feeling they don't want us anywhere." She held out her hands as if weighing possibilities. "Do we go looking for the paperwork or the labs?"
Wanda tapped the map against her hand as she gave it a quick thought. "Paperwork first," she said slowly. "The paperwork will, I think, make looking for the rest easier if we can find it." She went still as she carefully, for she knew she had a loud mental voice and was always very conscious of projecting, sent that thought to Emma. No sense in them wondering about without her knowing where they went.
#Give me a second,# sent back Emma and, while maintaining a conversation about adverse reactions to a flu vaccine Agria was manufacturing, took the opportunity to gently sidle her mind past some of the outer layers of Dr Williams' natural shielding. #I don't think there's much on computer. There's a records section somewhere. With security cabinets, locked. Safe locks. And drawers behind drawers.# Emma delved a touch further and then used the link to send a quick mental map to Wanda and Sarah, a room highlighted in yellow. #Try there,# she said and then closed the link down to a cobweb-thin thread of consciousness. Dr Williams was a fast talker and efficient about dealing with the reports. Emma was going to have to concentrate to keep this conversation going for long enough to let Wanda and Sarah do their thing.
"This looks like it." Sarah pointed at the door, the only door in the entire building without a nameplate label. Maybe they thought 'Keep out' was too obvious. "You think they've got it rigged to set off the alarm if you just turn the handle?"
"They do," Wanda replied with just a casual glance at the door. Strong red strings branched on in a number of directions from the door itself and several from the handle. However, there were one or two possibilities that wouldn't bring the house down around their ears. So to speak. A tweak there and the system suddenly ... hiccuped, reacting as if someone with an authorized keycard had swiped it through.
Seeing a window of opportunity that wouldn't last long, Wanda quickly opened the door and shuffled both Sarah and herself in.
Inside was a wall of filing cabinets, no doubt meticulously organized, just like Emma had promised. "I don't suppose anything's filed 'For company eyes only'?
"Let's ask, shall we?" As she started towards the filing cabinets, unable to shake the claustrophobic feeling that crowded in once the door had closed behind them, Wanda carefully sent out a thread of thought.
#Emma? By chance does Dr. Williams happen to have a favorite filing cabinet or two?#
#It's a security cabinet,# responded Emma, flashing a quick picture of a dull grey, obviously heavy filing cabinet with a safe combination lock on the front of it. #Let me look deeper.# Emma closed down the thread for a moment, concentrating all her power into Dr Williams' mind, past the (she was pleased to note) dull matters of regulatory compliance that filled his conscious mind, slipping again past the anxious caution that hid whatever Agria was doing. She rummaged lightly amongst the memories and found what she was looking for. #It's against the back wall. Third from the left. There's a false drawer behind the real drawers.# Emma made a noise down the telepathic thread that could best be described as a snort. #It's red and flashing with danger signs in his head. I think Dr Williams might be more than a little worried about what's in that cabinet.#
Wanda and Sarah quickly located the cabinet in question - if not for Emma's ability to peel back the layers of Dr. Williams like an onion, they would have wasted precious time (and a lot of it) trying to locate the right one. Jennie's power was luck based, Wanda had to rely on other things to make her own luck. "We'll probably need to pull out a few of these drawers to get to the false one," she said quietly, putting thought to action as she yanked the first one free of it's rollers.
The heavy drawer clattered as it came free, and Sarah winced. "Sneaky, we are not." She grabbed another drawer and pulled it free in the same manner as Wanda had, peeking her head inside the space it left behind. She pulled on a lever hidden in what seemed like the back of the cabinet, and it pulled loose easily. Coming out slowly from the space between the drawers, she muttered, "Hello hidden drawer, we've been looking for you."
"Normally I'd see what we'd found but we still have one more place to cover before we can hightail it out of here." Wanda carefully reached into the drawer that Sarah had pulled free and brought out a sheaf of papers that had been loosely bound together. Popping open her suit jacket allowed her to ruck up the back of her shirt so she could slip it between her waist and her pants before tucking everything back in.
"We'll take a look at the papers once we're safely in the labs with the doors locked behind us."
"Just don't sweat all over them," Sarah grinned, and returned the file drawers to their original position. If they were really lucky, the company might not even realize the papers were gone before they had figured out what they needed from them. She opened the door out into the hallway, and gestured Wanda out of the room. "To the labs?"
Wanda had looked faintly outraged at the idea that she might sweat all over the papers but she waved a hand half-regally as they headed towards the doors. "Once we're in, we'll look through the paperwork and find what we need." She was projecting in Emma's direction, letting them know where they were going. "Let's just hope Emma's not having any trouble with our boy."
#If you could move quickly, that would be most appreciated,# Emma sent back softly down the link. #I've taken nearly as much time as I can over this paperwork. If the search goes on much longer, I'm going to have to start seducing him Let's just say that I would prefer that does not become necessary.#
Wanda made a face at that as she turned back to Sarah. "How fast do you think we can run to the labs without attracting attention, then?"
"Just look like you're about to miss a meeting. I doubt that's something they even notice around here." And with that, she began to stride purposefully down the hallway, with as wide of strides as her legs would allow.
By virtue of having done this exact walk so many times in her life that she had long ago lost track, Wanda pulled ahead slightly. "The labs we want are, of course, downstairs," she commented over her shoulder, voice pitched so as not to carry to anyone who might be near by. "If we want to keep this charade as PG-13 as possible, I'll try to blow through whatever security systems we encounter." She snorted. "That might bring more local guards running, though."
It was always hard to tell with her abilities but the labs would probably be more secure than the filing room they had just been in.
They arrived at the end of the hallway without incident, and as they reached the door to the stairwell the security scan sparked and popped, the view screen flashing "Initializing" as the unit reset itself from the sudden power surge. Sarah followed Wanda through the now unlocked door, and hurried behind her as they made their way down the stairs. "I don't suppose that can be the only thing we run across before we get to the labs..."
"Probably not and, truth be told, some of these security 'blips' are sure to be noticed sooner than later." With them through one set of doors, Wanda had fished out the files and had started flipping through them in order to try and get a sense of what they needed to find. "Let's hope that we're at the lab by the time that happens."
The pair slowed as they hit the bottom of the stairs and found themselves confronted with yet another door. A touch in their minds informed them that the labs were being watched over by a few guards. If they hadn't already known something was up, armed guards were certainly a very large clue.
Wanda carefully tucked the papers back under her jacket where they wouldn't get damaged and then shared a smile with Sarah. "Let's say hello, shall we?"