Into The Fog - Helter Skelter

[x-roulette.livejournal.com]

Hammersmith & Fulham, London, Two years ago.

warning - graphic and potentially disturbing imagery



They had been wrong. They had been so wrong. John. Daffyd. Her. They had thought they were winning, but that night Mother had shown her hand.

When Charles Mason had sent his Family to the Tate home to kick off Helter Skeltor, the term he used for the race riots he kept predicting in his apocalyptic sermons, he had them kill the people in house as gruesome as they could and "leave some witchy stuff" in order to inspire greater terror.

Mother's Disciples loved to take a page from that book.

All of Clarent house was dead. Torn to pieces. Their bodies displayed gruesomely. Nonsensical rhymes were written in blood on the wall, and above it all John Preston was hung like a Christmas angel from the top of the viewscreen, entrails dangling. The words to "I am the Walrus, Goo Goo Ka Choo" were splattered behind him.

All of them were dead. Tamsin. Courtney. Hal. Sarwat. Daffyd. John. Winston.

All of them, save two. One was missing, and the other Nigel found locked in the specimen room. 10-year-old Danni had crawled up the ventilation shaft to get a signal to phone Jennie. Now she was there, filthy, shocked and crying. But alive.

"Danni?"

"He said you'd come," the girl hiccuped in-between sobs. "He said you'd come and you did!"

"Danni," Jennie said firmly, brushing the girl's hair out of her face. "Danni look at me. Who said?"

"Donal," Danni replied. "Donal put me in the safe and said he and Winston would make sure they couldn't get me and I was to call you and you'd come get me," she sniffled. "And I called and you came," the girl threw her arms around Jennie's neck.

Jennie looked up, meeting Pash's eyes. She was sure the expression of horror there mirrored her own.

"We... we didn't see him down there," said Nigel. "We couldn't find..." he cast a look at the girl crying in Jennie's arms. "Him."

"Keep looking," said Jennie. "He has to be here somewhere." She hefted the girl in her arms. "I want a full tally of everyone we've lost. Bring them to the great room. I'll put Danni in the kitchen." She felt like someone else was in her body, giving orders. She couldn't connect feelings to the words, feelings she knew she should be having. Horror, terror, unending sadness. She remembered the X-Men's rule of thumb, they weren't dead unless there was a body. But seeing the absolute savagery that littered the great room-- the way John's body had been displayed, she had no hope.

Half an hour later she sat in the great room, surrounded by the bodies of her friends and teammates. All of them, save one.

"We looked everywhere," said Pash, still pale from shock. Her hands trembled as she covered up Courtney's face.

"There's not a single sign. I found traces of blood near the safe-- Winston's-- and burns from Donal, but not enough to indicate anything," said Nigel. He was smoking in direct violation of the health code, but honestly Jennie didn't give a shit. She needed one herself.

"That doesn't mean anything," said Jennie, placing John's body with the rest and wiping her hands on a towel, knowing they would never, ever be clean again. "He could have been taken and tortured somewhere else." Jennie's tone was brusque and business-like, the tremor in her hands was not.

"We can do another sweep, but I don't know that we'll find anything," said Pash.

"And even if we do, who's to say they won't come back?" said Nigel. "We need to go, soon. Leave it and burn it to the ground so they can't get anything else."

"And leave them?" Pash said, gesturing at the covered bodies at her feet.

"What else can we do? They're dead." Nigel sneered at her. Shock was making him slip back into old bad habits.

"But they're our friends!"

"And they're dead! I'm sure they would appreciate us being alive!"

Jennie put two fingers in her mouth, giving a shrill whistle.

"All right!" she said, holding up both her hands. "This helps no one. My power's telling me that he's 'thataway'" Jennie pointed somewhere southeast. "so we can finish up here, and start looking for him. Until we see bodies, we assume that he isn't dead."

Nigel threw up his hands in disgust. "Just because you don't want to accept the fact that your puppy might be dead doesn't give you the right to get us killed as we--" he didn't get to finish, as Jennie stood up, walked over, and slammed him against the wall, holding him by the throat.

"I said that's enough," Jennie said, her voice icy. "Nigel, I understand you are upset but you will keep any unnecessary comments to yourself or so help me God I will rip your tongue out of your mouth. And I know how long it will take you to grow it back. So don't. Tempt. Me." she said, before releasing him. He coughed and pulled at his collar.

Jennie rubbed her face, "We are tired. We are upset. We have been cleaning up our friends for the past half hour, and I don't know about you but I am one giant, frayed nerve. But we have to keep going until we know what happened to Donal. I want everyone accounted for, dead and alive."

"--Here's something," said Pash. Jennie and Nigel turned.

"What?" said Jennie.

Pash held up a thumb drive. "This was around John's neck. It's not his." She unrolled a small piece of paper that had been taped to it. It said "Watch Me" in frilly, cursive script.

Jennie swallowed and held out her hand, her eyes flicking to Nigel. "Perhaps we won't have so far to go," she said. He had the decency to look ashamed.

Jennie plugged it into one of the Great Room's computers while Pash took a chair and began typing, calling up whatever data was on it. It was a video file. They exchanged identical wide-eyed looks.

"You don't have to watch this Jennie," said Pash. "Nigel and I can handle it." Nigel nodded.

"No," said Jennie, her voice level. "Cue it."

There was a click, and then the screen on the far wall blinked to life. Mother's assistant, Cutter, stood in the center of the Great Room, his gray suit neat and blood free. He was surrounded by Mother's Disciples. They were less so.

"Oh my God, there's so many of them," Pash whispered.

Jennie felt a cold sensation travel up her spine. She could count at least 10, maybe 11. The rest of Clarent House hadn't stood a chance.

"Greetings," said Cutter. "Nemesis, Mr. Griffith, and Io... I believe? We were going to wait for you but decided that time was of the essence, as we have an engagement we need to be attending to," he clapped his hands and smiled. "I have some fantastic news, we are welcoming a new member to the family tonight, and on this auspicious occasion we cannot leave Mother waiting. So consider this a ...rain check on our part."

Jennie put a hand on one of the consoles to steady herself. New member to the family. A sick horror was spreading through her stomach. There were eleven disciples, and there were two shapes that they stood in front of. Jennie wanted the video to stop, coldly certain she knew what was next.

Cutter turned and motioned for some of the disciples to move. And...

The picture-- Jennie's mind seemed to skip over it. It couldn't comprehend what it was seeing, because there was just no way. None at all. She closed her eyes and shook her head.

Focus, Jennie, Focus. You have to. John is dead. Daffyd is dead. You are in charge.

She opened her eyes. Made herself comprehend what she was seeing, even though it made her want to start screaming and not stop. Because it told them where the two unaccounted bodies were.

Behind Cutter were Donal and Winston. Both of them were on their knees, being held up by Mother's people. They had been beaten within an inch of their lives, Winston's nose was still dripping blood, and Donal's skin was blotchy and red in telltale patches where he had bled and burned himself.

"As you can see, we only needed the one," Cutter said. "They both fought valiantly, and as such both are still alive."

One of Mother's people pulled Donal's head up by his hair, his eyelids fluttered to show that he was still breathing, and the person holding his hair let him go.

Cutter smiled coldly. "However, it seems our math is wrong." He twitched his finger from side to side between the two, deciding, before he clicked his fingers, and in one quick motion there was a flash and a flick, and Winston's throat opened from ear to ear. Slashed by the Disciple behind him. They let his body fall with a thud.

"One of yours for one of ours. It's only fair, after all," Cutter stepped in front of Donal and Winston's body. "We will be seeing you soon."

And the video ended, leaving a black screen and Jennie wanting to scream, cry and vomit. The only sounds in the great room were Danni's soft, hiccuping sobs, coming from the kitchen, mirroring Jennie's own despair.

Jennie decided she could do none of those things. She took a deep breath and looked at Pash and Nigel. Nigel was so pale he was almost green, and Pash had two silent tear-tracks running down her cheeks. They both looked to her, and that same sick swell of panic rose up in Jennie again.

John's dead, Daffyd's dead. That leaves you. You're in charge. Jennie clenched her hands into fists. So now what?

Routines that had been drilled into her bubbled through her brain. Nothing else except that one tiny thing John had repeated to her over and over. John knew patterns, and knew her better than she could ever know herself. This one fact was a beacon in all of her panic. She felt herself nod.

"Right," she turned and knelt beside the console, feeling alongside it before growing impatient and using a quick disk to rip open the side, digging down into the wires and things before finding what she was looking for. A lump buried up near the back. There was a rip as Jennie yanked the tape lose and came up with a pay-as-you-go mobile. She thumbed the button on, and then called the only number in the directory. It rang twice before a bland female voice answered.

"Clarent House, what is your 10?" there was no emotion in the voice, even though Jennie's phonecall meant Absolutely Dire circumstances.

"HQ has been compromised-- invaded. Mother found us." Jennie heard herself say, only a faint tremor in her voice. "Multiple casualties. Few survivors."

"How many survivors?" said the voice.

"Just three. Codenames: Nemesis, Io, and Cooper."

"And the others?"

"Dead," Jennie said softly.

"--All of them?"

"All save one."

The voice waited for Jennie to finish.

Jennie took a deep breath. Saying it was going to make it true, and that hurt so much that Jennie was afraid she was going to fall over. "Fian has been taken."

There was a pause from the other end of the line. "Do you believe she intends to Recruit?" the voice said.

Jennie swallowed the thick lump of bile in her throat. "I do. They said one of ours for one of theirs, it was only fair."

There was a second longer pause. "Do you have an evac plan?"

Jennie looked at Pash and Nigel, who were both watching her, looking so lost. "We do," said Jennie.

"Enact it. You are at code 14," the voice said, still emotionless as ever. "You are Clarent House now. And Clarent House is hereby disavowed until further notice. You have a half hour to collect what you need before we come to slash and burn."

"The safehouses?" Jennie said, her eyes flicking to Pash and Nigel.

"Maintained. But we will disavow if compromised. Understood?"

"Yes," said Jennie.

"Good. Update when you can, Nemesis."

"Understood," said Jennie.

"Good luck," said the voice. And for once, it seemed to mean it.

Jennie ended the call and tossed it on one of the tables.

"Who was that?" said Nigel.

"John's boss," said Jennie, flicking her bangs out of her eyes. Pash and Nigel were staring at her, almost comedically slack-jawed.

"John has a boss?" said Pash.

"John has-- had a boss," Jennie said, pinching the bridge of her nose.

"I thought John had been disavowed?" Pash said.

"Officially, yes, unofficially no. It was to protect the..." Jennie paused, they had never given her a name. "Powers That Be... from Mother. In case something like this--" she gestured around her. "Happened."

"So, what did they say?" asked Nigel.

"Well, we are now officially and unofficially disavowed." Jennie said, rubbing the back of her head. Pash closed her eyes and swore.

"No help at all?" said Pash.

"'Fraid not. We have a half hour to grab anything we need before they come and take care of HQ," Jennie's eyes moved to the covered bodies of their friends. "Including the rest of the team."

"And what about us?" Nigel demanded.

"Well, we, start gathering things," Jennie walked to the wall and hit a series of codes, ignoring the blood splattered across it. The wall opened up to reveal shelves of supplies. "Grab a bag, we need money in different currencies, passports, identities, and we need forgery kits--"

"But we have enough for the three of us," said Nigel.

"I know, but there are three other people who will be needing them," she met Nigel's eyes. He looked confused. "Think, Nige, what is the first thing a new recruit does?" Nigel swallowed.

It was strange, the switch that had flipped inside of Jennie. Emotions were ruthlessly put to the side in order to deal with the problem at hand. It was horrible, to know that that tiny tug of 'thataway' that told her where Donal was, knowing what was about to happen to him, and knowing there was no way to stop it. He was every bit as dead as the team that was spread out on the floor. And what was worse, if Jennie and the others didn't act quickly enough, his father would join him.

They kill what they loved best as an act of loyalty. They sever their ties to this world and devote themselves wholly to Mother. And what's worse, they enjoy it.

"Donal's father will need our protection. I want you to watch over Donal's father, Nigel," she began cramming things into bags. "I'll be sending you both to a safehouse in a roundabout way, Pash will be watching Danni in another location."

"What about my parents?" said Pash. "Aren't they a target?"

"John had a backup protocol for each of us. A way for our families to disappear in case we were... compromised. Pash, your father will suddenly find himself attending a very prestigious seminar in a far-away country that is also coincidentally very top secret. He will be gone for a year at the very least." Pash nodded, and began to pack alongside Jennie.

"Nige--"

"There are some benefits to not having much of a family," Nigel said for Jennie, with only a hint of bitterness.

"And you, Jennie?" said Pash. "Won't you be one of the ones Donal goes after?"

Those words fell like stones into Jennie's stomach. But she and John had worked with that possibility. Plans had been drawn in the sanctity of John's office, just in case. She'd felt awful, going behind Donal's back. But John always thought of everything.

"I'll be running," Jennie said. "I'll keep moving through the continent, trying to keep him away from his father."

"And your family?" said Nigel.

Jennie stopped. "Donal never met my family. He knows very little about them, and it's hard to link me to them. We haven't been close in a while," she said softly. "It was a blessing, in a way."

They resumed packing in silence. Jennie then made a series of phonecalls as Nigel and Pash swept the room, pulling important files and anything else that was deemed necessary. Once they were finished they stood in the center of The Great Room, taking it in one last time.

This was home, thought Jennie. This was my home, until that bitch took it from me. Her hand clenched into a fist. The plan was to stay alive for the time being, but at a certain point she knew she she wouldn't be running anymore. The likelihood of her surviving the year was slim, and if she was going to go down, she would do it in a way that Mother would remember.

Jennie handed Nigel and Pash folded pieces of paper. "These are mobile numbers, memorize them. It's a way to get in contact with the powers that be. Call them once you are in the safehouses with Donal's father and Danni. They will give you a way to get in touch with me. I will be checking in when I can. Always use a disposable phone. Always destroy the phone once you are done. Burn the paper when you have the number memorized. James is going to the train station, he'll have a flight out of Edinburgh, someone from the Powers That Be will see to him, but that's all the help they'll give us. We're on our own after that. I'll get Danni to the airport. There is a flight number here for each of you, you are booked under Poowa Choudhury and Gareth Gwynn respectively. Nige, James will be at your destination. You have a new flight after that."

"Where are we going?" said Pash.

"I have no idea," Jennie said with a wry smile. "None of us will. None of us should reveal any of the other's locations in case of compromise." Pash and Nigel nodded.

"We have maybe 12 hours before they-- we have 12 hours. I want us all as far away from here as possible. Are we ready?" Jennie said.

Nigel looked around the room, his face unreadable, before turning back to Jennie. He stuck out his hand and Jennie clasped it. Pash put hers atop them.

"It has been an honor," said Nigel.

"Yes, it has," said Pash, her voice thick.

Jennie put her other hand atop Pash's and gave both hands a squeeze. "I'll see you on the other side of this," said Jennie, with a confidence that she did not feel on the inside.

Both Pash and Nigel nodded, and then Pash hugged Jennie and slipped out down one of the corridors, Jennie could hear her talking to Danni and the scrape of a chair. Nigel put a hand on Jennie's shoulder. He seemed like he wanted to say something, but thought better of it. He left in another direction, leaving Jennie by herself in the great room.

She looked at where John's body lay on the floor, covered by a blanket. She thought of him sitting across from her in her old flat, looking out of place in his nice suit and her shabby furniture.

"You can't leave this life, it becomes you."

"Until it kills you," Jennie finished for him, looking at his body. She felt tears threaten, and she blinked them away knowing that once she started crying she would not be able to stop.

Exhaling, she shouldered her bag. She had 12 hours. It was time to move.



New York City.



Cutter stood again in front of the Disciples, his gloating smile frozen in place on the screen in an office that Jennie had commandeered. Amanda, Doug and Marie-Ange with her.

"This was left with John Preston's body the night she wiped out Clarent House," Jennie said, her tone back to being brusque and business-like. "The man in the suit is named Cutter, and he serves as Mother's ambassador, since no one has ever actually seen her. The people behind her are her Disciples. There are always thirteen, note their distinctive eyes," Jennie used a laser pointer to circle one of the Disciples. They all had irises the color of sour milk, jagged black lines exploding from the pupil. "That's the one thing they can't hide."

"Why thirteen? Why can they not use contact lenses? How do they know the leader is Mother if no one has seen her... or him.. or it." Marie-Ange had a barrage of questions, though only the last one was all that relevant - it was that or try and fail to comfort Jennie and Marie-Ange was horrid at comforting almost anyone. "I hate cults. They never make sense. There is always some lunatic making rules because they hate cats or something."

"Not sure why the number, perhaps it's lucky," Jennie said dryly, distributing folders. "Contact lenses have been used on occasion, but they make them look even more dead, they prefer sunglasses. As for that last instance," Jennie made a face. "Cutter, or her other ambassadors are all we've encountered. But they all reference Mother, their Mother, their love for their Mother, doing Mother's bidding, etcetera etcetera."

"The ones we saw on the ship did the same," Amanda said shortly. It was clear that the witch was blaming herself for the disaster that had been the mission, but even more, she wanted to take these monsters down. "And it's not unusual for these sorts of demon-worshipping cults to call the demon something parental like that. Doesn't make it any less creepy, tho'."

"The folders I'm giving you are the data that Clarent House had before we got wiped out, the Disciples we knew, their histories. Everything."

Jennie opened one of the folders and leafed through the information. "Mother first appeared on our radar in 2007. And from there we used her M.O. and started tracing her backward. 2007, Tube bombing, blamed on Islamic terrorists, 53 dead and 123 injured, five months before two people disappeared, Richard Hood and Giles Turpin. Hood's wife and children butchered in their beds and Turpin's boyfriend's remains dragged from the pond." Jennie produced photographs as she talked, each a new and grisly reminder of the absolute cruelty another being could produce.

"2000, Manchester, gas explosion, 47 dead 213 injured, Susanna Perkins, local magistrate, disappeared a month before, while there weren't enough left of her parents to bury. 1995, Northern Ireland, car bombing. Blamed on the IRA, 57 dead, 114 injured and five months before that..." Jennie slapped a final picture down. "Seamus McNaly, who, survey says..."

"Disappeared, with those closet to him turning up horribly dead." Amanda finished for her. "'M surprised Pete and his people didn't pick this up as well, considering the pattern." She looked up at the video screen again, frowning slightly. "So, they recruit someone, that someone's family is slaughtered, and then..." The witch stopped her thought, looking from the screen to Jennie. "Wait - the bloke they're holding, the one whose face they show. He was the other one. On the ship."

"Donal McGrath," Jennie said, her voice soft. "Recruited last year after the slaughter of Clarent House. Age 28, his only living relative is his father, who remains in protective custody. He's a mutant as well, his blood had a compound in it that turns it to acid once it hits the the nitrogen in the air," Jennie slid out his file to the others, showing his picture and stats. "He was also my partner, and a very good man."

"Emphasis on the 'was', I take it." Doug had been cataloging information mentally, taking in every aspect of the video footage Jennie was showing them. A demon wearing the face of someone you trusted - it hadn't quite been the same with Skippy, but enough that Doug suspected some of what Jennie might be feeling. The discovery that Jennie had become part of a clandestine organization during her time in Britain was something of a surprise as well. "And Donal's nearest and dearest?" He suspected the answer wouldn't be a good one.

"Safe" Jennie said, "For now. We had enough warning from the video to get them to safety before he turned. The problem with Mother is that for a while the Home Office believed that her recruits went willingly, it wasn't until my team started looking into it that we realized that her recruits are anything but. What Mother does is take the darkness inside of you and makes it manifest. Every horrible thought you've ever had, every bad thing you've ever wanted to do. You become your shadow. She likes heroes. She likes idealists. Because they're so much fun to twist and break. And the very first thing they do when she takes them is slaughter the people they loved best."

"Ugh. So all the people we would help to protect from this are most vulnerable." Marie-Ange said, frowning. "And we will need to watch everyone for a while, just in case. Perhaps get Emma to check our people."

"So, I get the corruption and the slaughter of the families - it makes sense, in a fucked-up demon cult sort of way." Amanda said. "But what's with the terrorism? It seems a bit too... political, if that makes sense?"

"That's the rub," Jennie said, perching on the edge of the desk. "The working theory the Home Office had was that she fed on mayhem, but this is a specifically planned mayhem. It's like it's designed to make people in power look bad, like whatever they do they can't keep their citizens safe. And it's usually blamed on the de rigeur bad guy of the moment. Unionists. The IRA. Islamists. Whatever Mother is, she doesn't like the establishment." Jennie added dryly. "I've read your report about the ship, and the list that they stole. Which is strange. She's strictly British bound, or has been since the end of World War II. That's when she popped up. So the fact that she's now got a list of US representatives information, and their families, is very strange for her."

"For the rest of it," Jennie rubbed the back of her neck. "It seems like a trial run of a new Recruit. They don't slaughter wholesale like that, too much attention. Not unless they're letting someone stretch their legs. Since Donal has been with them for a year now, you should check out the other one North fought. See if anyone with his background has gone missing in Scotland recently, like someone with knowledge of explosives. He may be military."

"We're already looking into it, but yeah, any further information would help. And we might have more on the cult than we realized - now we have a name and a MO, we might be able to track them to before the thirties, if they were around." Amanda sighed, reaching into her pocket for her cigarettes automatically before she stopped herself and reached for her tea mug instead. "With this list, this 'Mother' can do a fuck tonne of damage. This whole thing's one big, ugly mess."

"Especially given the current climate surrounding mutants, it could get a lot worse." Doug didn't want to think about what might happen if this Mother decided to use mutants to start committing terrorist acts. He perused the information in front of him, then looked back to the screen of footage. "Huh. What's with mouthpiece guy? He doesn't look like the others. Looks completely human, in fact."

"She's always got one that doesn't look like the others but is her most devoted servant. He always appears totally human. Always able to slip in and out of society, and gets switched out every few years ago. This version calls himself Cutter. As for what we have on him-- nothing," Jennie shrugged. "It's like this guy never existed before Mother. We ran down every bank record, every CCTV recording, every hospital registry. Nothing, nada, zip." Jennie sighed. "His accent is definitely London, kind of posh, so there's that. But for all we know he could be Swiss, or Jamaican, or Martian," Jennie threw her hands up. "But if he shows up somewhere, Mother's not far behind."

"But if he's the public face, he could be our best link to finding Mother and the rest of the group." Amanda looked at Marie-Ange. "I'm guessing this one's going on the 'urgent active cases' list?"

Marie-Ange frowned. "Considering everyone came back a mess, yes." She rubbed at her forehead. "I was really hoping we would get to avoid demons and cults for at least a few months." From her jacket she pulled a package of tarot cards, and slipped a few blanks from the box. "Jennie, can you get me photographs of your team? I want to sit down with you and the cards and see what we can see."

"Yeah, they're in the files, I'll print some out," Jennie rubbed her eyes. "I know I'm not part of this team, and you guys have your thing going, but I was trained and ran with John Peston for two and a half years, and technically I'm the one in charge of Clarent House now, since our officers are both dead. I also have several people under my protection. I need to be kept in the loop with anything you come up with. Remy was keeping an ear out for me, and now that Mother's made herself known again-- I know her and her people better than anyone else right now."

"Not an issue." Amanda exchanged looks with Doug and Marie-Ange to confirm. "And with the new shared system, most of our stuff is accessible any way. But it goes both ways. I know there's personal angles here for you, Jennie, but you need to let us know everything if we're going to keep people safe and find this monster."

"It's all the the files," Jennie said. "She whacked my team, and sentenced someone I cared about to a fate worse than death," she hesitated then. "Which is why we need to keep ourselves as secret from her as possible. She found a way to get into our headquarters, and we were special services. 2/3 of the MI5 didn't even know we were real. The thing that terrifies me the most is that she'll find this place, and then what happened on that ship will look like a walk in the park."

"Then we review periodically, telepathically and magically, and have multiple fail safes. We will do as much as possible to prevent her getting to someone here, and with the resources available here, we have several avenues of defense." Marie-Ange said, quietly and firmly. "Jennie, I think I understand why you did not tell anyone, but..." She shook her head. "If you had said, we could have started looking earlier."

"The people that needed to know knew," Jennie said, her manner calm and her eyes steely. She would not be lectured on keeping secrets. "It was at their discretion that they chose not to tell. For another thing, I'm one of the people Donal was hunting. If it came to be that my presence at the school was in any way a danger, I was to leave immediately. I still will. And I didn't want people following after me if it meant putting the school at risk. Don't let your firepower make you cocky. Think about what just two Disciples did. Now think if you had all 13 at you. We got complacent, and it cost us."

Jennie sighed and began to arrange the folders. "I can ping in with a couple of my people, see if they've noticed anything. But," she looked up. "Congratulations. You met Mother and lived."

"Like I said, I think I understand. I just wish it could have been different." Marie-Ange said, her mouth twisted in sadness and frustration. "We need to talk to Professor Xavier then at least. He needs to know, if he does not already." She was nearly certain he knew, it would be hard for him not to. "And we put all our heads together and see what we can figure out to lessen the risk of infiltration. I think that needs to be our top priority until we have more information."

"Indeed," Jennie said, and then sat, ready to begin again.

Once more unto the breach..