Voices Carry: Part 2 - SCP Foundation

Adams stood up, slowly, so as not to piss off either of the people pointing guns at her. "Well, it's been fun, but, ah, perhaps we should get going so you can attend to these new guests of yours," she said as she gestured towards the pair of people very clearly reaching for concealed handguns in the doorway.

"Wha… No, hold on." The man sitting behind the desk named… Murone? Moore? Something with an M, stood up as well. "Those two just said you're Foundation."

"Yeah, and they got a source for that?" She glared at Foxx, who finally seemed to get the hint and shot out of his chair, which only earned him two guns pointed at him.

"Ah, apologies, friends…" Foxx muttered as he raised his hands in an inoffensive gesture. Adams wondered how many bullets he would take before they noticed her making a break for it.

"Look, the money's good, right?" Adams pointed to the briefcase sitting next to Murray.

"Well, yes, but-"

"Good! So we're good!" Adams snatched up the flash drive with one hand and grabbed Foxx by the collar as she started inching backwards. "Well, it's been fun, but I think it's time we conclude our proceedings."

Nothing. Michael's face turned from confused to angered. "You stop right there. You're not leaving here with that."

"Ah, no we- we were just…" Adams looked over her shoulder. The only thing behind her was the door to the women's room. "I was just saying we should conclude our proceedings!"

Absolute silence. Everyone just stared at her, and Foxx seemed to be ducking down as much as he could while Adams was still holding him by his shirt collar. That was the goddamn code. Iris was supposed to start shooting. Where the hell was that girl?

Iris wound up for another kick between the legs, just to be sure he was really gonna stay down. Then another to be extra safe. Fuck it, another because he was weird yesterday.

If what that Asian woman in the photograph of the other room was doing was anything to go by, they were probably Coalition, so she couldn't just double-tap him without causing a diplomatic incident. Eh, he wasn't rolling around enough. One more kick ought to do it.

Alright, well, chances were everyone would be heading for the exfiltration point in the garage, if what Adams had said was anything to go by. Iris snapped her head to look out the window as soon as she thought of that. Shit, she hadn't been able to watch what had happened. She jammed her hand into her coat pocket, sifting past the photos she'd been watching that guy walk up to her through, and settled on the seventh one.

Pulling it out, she saw Adams pick Foxx up by the shirt collar and… throw him out of a window. Wow. Iris didn't take her as the type to snap first, but she supposed better Foxx than her, guy was a-

"My leg!" Foxx's voice came from the photograph as Adams jumped after him.

Oh, right, there was a terrace out there. Ah, well. Guess she was still stuck with them. Iris brought the photo closer to her face. "Adams?"

"Iris!" She sounded pissed as she yanked Foxx onto his feet and started jogging. "Where the hell were you?"

"Coalition agent tried to get the drop on me," Iris replied as she stared walking towards the emergency exit stairwell.

"Shit. Did you get him?"

Iris looked over her shoulder to the blithering mass rolling around on the ground. "Yeah, all clear. Did you end up getting what we came for?" Iris stuck her hand through the photo.

"Yeah, here you go." Adams took a moment away from making sure Foxx's bone would fit back into his leg alright to hand Iris a flash drive, which she then dumped into a picture of a lockbox in Site-17. "We might be a little late to the garage, someone forgot how to take a landing."

"My leg is in multiple pieces!" Foxx sounded more indignant than pained.

"It always is, dumbass. That's how bones work. That green shit'll heal up fine anyways," Adams said as she jammed a piece of bone back behind Foxx's shin in spite of his audible discomfort.

Iris groaned and tucked the picture back into its place, taking another one out as she pushed open the heavy metal door and started running down the staircase down to the sublevels of the building. probably a good idea to see if whoever was in the office was following Adams.

Fourth, fifth, and sixth photos. Looks like the office had been evacuated, so Iris missed them. She shoved the sixth photo into her pocket, then the fifth before she noticed movement on the fourth. A black-haired woman was fiddling with what looked like the door to a safe for a few seconds before she ducked away and the door blew open.

Iris slowed down. The office had been empty for ten, maybe fifteen seconds at this point? If this woman had gotten in so quickly, she must have been waiting for the opportunity beforehand.

The woman fished some metal cylinder out of the safe and tossed it up and down in her hand, chuckling to herself. Iris squinted at the picture. If this person knew exactly what was going to happen, there was a good chance she'd need to report her appearance…

The black-haired woman stopped, and Iris stopped walking as well. She slowly looked up to make exact eye contact with Iris, who nearly dropped the photo. How the hell…

No, she wouldn't have been able to see anything on her end. Probably some coincidence.

As soon as Iris had that thought, the woman bolted. Cursing, Iris smashed the photo back into her pocket haphazardly and began running again. She had bigger problems.

As soon as Spider got to the top of the stairs, she heard the door to the emergency stairwell to her right slam. She turned to look, but was pulled away by Skunkboy's moans. She felt her stomach drop as she saw him rolling around on the ground.

"Skunkie! Skunkie, oh gods, did you get hit?" Spider asked as she ran to his side. He only groaned in response.

"Muh… my… my balls…" was all he managed to get out in between breaths.

"You… oh my gods," Spider said as her face immediately changed to one of annoyance. "I thought you got shot!"

"It fuckin' hurts!"

"I was getting period cramps during our last op and I wasn't bitching about it!" The sheer audacity of Skunkboy to be rolling around on the ground in a time like this. Spider unthinkingly slapped him like she was used to doing when they were bantering - which hit him between the legs again. Okay, that one was on her.

"Spider, come in." Spider's hand jumped from Skunkboy, who was now rolling around even more, to her earpiece. "Get me a reading on where the TEs are headed."

"Right, one second." Spider threw aside the bandages that she thought she was going to need and reached for her tablet. "Looks like… ours is headed down to the garage, and the other two are still in your building."

A pause while Bullfrog considered his options. "Alright. We'll cut them off in the garage. Regroup on me, understood?"

"Yes, sir!" Spider responded dutifully. Skunkboy continued groaning.

"Is Skunkboy hit?" Bullfrog asked in the same tone of voice he used all the time.

"Nah, one of the Threat Entities just kicked him in the balls."

"Like SEVEN TIMES!" Oh, there you go. Looks like he finally managed to say something coherent. See, he was fine.

Bullfrog snorted. "Eh, tell him to get over it. Happened to me." With that, he disconnected.

"At least mine still work, I got something to mourn," Skunkboy muttered as he tried rolling onto his stomach to stand up.

Jackie calmly stepped out of the elevator and made her way through the sublevel tunnels at an even pace. Public operations were all about acting natural, or so she'd been told. Honestly, she hadn't been around to walk around in cities that weren't already destroyed for a little while, and it's not like she had much experience in clandestine operations besides. At least now all they had to do was make it to the car and drive away.

Although Adams and Foxx seemed like they were going to be a while with that leg injury. Was Jackie supposed to get the car? She hadn't driven since she'd gotten her augmentations in, but Adams had explicitly told Jackie that Iris couldn't drive. Apparently she'd tried teaching her, but Iris just managed to hit the only parked car in Site-17's axillary lot when she got behind the wheel, then demanded that Adams pay for the damages since she was the one who messed up teaching. Which did sound like Iris, but it's not like a skip could really make any money in the-

Jackie bumped into a black-haired woman, her imposing size knocking them to the ground. Ah, she should really be more careful. She must have gained a foot and fifty pounds after the augmentations were finished. "Sorry about that, my bad." She leaned down to help the person up. Being polite was part of not acting suspicious, right?

As soon as the person looked up, someone skidded around the corner of the hallway the woman came from, hopping on one foot as their inertia tried to slam them into the wall before tearing down the hall towards Jackie. They were blonde, wearing a dark blue suit, holding a camera - Oh god, it was Iris.

She looked surprised to see Jackie for a second before she started yelling "Jacqueline! Don't let her get out of here!"

The woman yipped and started to scamper away, but doing as she was told, Jackie grabbed her by the shoulder of her shirt and lifted her off the ground as her legs spun helplessly. It wasn't too hard, she wasn't much taller than Iris and about as stringy.

"Oh, oh god, please, I'll give you my money!" The woman Jackie's commander told her to grab was… hyperventilating? "Just let me go! I just got lost, okay? I have a family!" Tears were streaming down her face as she clasped her hands together as though praying.

"Don't you act dumb," Iris said in a stern voice as she pulled her revolver out of its holster and checked the cylinder.

"No! No, no, no, please! I'll give you whatever you want! Just let me go!" The fear in the woman's eyes compared to the coldness in Iris' was starting to concern Jackie.

"Iris, are you sure you got the right person? This doesn't look like a Coa-"

"Shut it, alright?" Iris spared three words and a one-second glance for Jackie before pointing her gun at the woman, who was furiously shaking her head as tears streamed down her face. Notably, she stopped several feet away so as to point her gun at both of them instead of walking up next to Jackie. Cool.

"God, look, I-I don't have a phone, but you can take my-"

"Cut the shit, alright? I saw you take something from the office as soon as it cleared out. No way in hell you just happened to be walking by with a shaped charge for a safe."

The woman looked at Iris, then to Jackie, then back to Iris again before letting out a long sigh and shrugging her shoulders. "Well," she said, with a bored expression as she wiped her face with her sleeve, "can't blame a girl for trying."

Jackie blinked a few times. She felt like she just got severe whiplash from what she just saw. "You can, ah, let me go now, big guy," she said as she gestured towards Iris. "I think your buddy's got me covered," she said as she tapped Jackie's arm a couple times and offered a wry smile.

Iris nodded to Jackie once, and she slowly lowered the woman down to the ground. Jackie was expecting her to bolt, but she just straightened out her clothes and ran her hand through her hair.

As soon as she did, Jackie felt a slight tugging sensation behind her eyes. Odd, as she didn't get headaches anymore, but even weirder was how it got worse when the black-haired woman looked at her. Just as Iris looked like she was about to say something, the woman snapped her fingers and pointed at the two of them with both hands. "I'd say Serpent's Hand, but you're dressed like narcs. So I'm gonna go wiiiiiith… Foundation?"

Iris gritted her teeth. She always seemed on edge, but this was… worse, somehow. Maybe she was feeling the same thing Jackie was? Jackie was used to stuff like this from all her trips, but it probably would set someone like Iris on edge. "Jacqueline, pat her down." Iris shifted her hand around the grip of her revolver. "She took something from the office, I saw her."

"Ah, I'll stop you right there." The woman held one hand out to stop Jackie, and grabbed something behind her back with the other. "Name's Anne, by the way."

She looked in between Iris and Jackie and gestured vaguely with her hands. "What, since you gave me yours. Only fair," Anne said as she plopped a metal cylinder in Jackie's hand.

Jackie turned it around in her hand. Looked a little bit like a battery-powered camp lantern, save for a lot of… what looked like pulsating electronics in the middle. Iris' eyes darted between Anne and the device almost faster than she could keep track of. Didn't seem like much, though, and Jackie had to make write-ups of technology native on her expeditions. Flipping it over to the other side, her finger pushed in on something in the paneling-

The sensation from before had felt like something pulling on Iris - not her body, but something that was her, somehow - but this one felt more like a gentle pressure. Lightly, almost politely pushing on her. Almost like a kind of osmosis, a small part of it came in.

[Hello/Welcome].

"You - what the hell was that?" Iris demanded. Anne looked bemused, and Jackie looked at her with a concerned look. Rich. "That - the voice!"

Anne blew air past her lips, which turned into laughter. "Wow, you good? They telling you to steal this place's copper wiring or something?"

"Quiet!" Iris pointed her gun at Anne… harder, or something.

"Iris, look. She's probably an infovore." Jacqueline looked around the hall they were in nervously. "Let's just take her in when Adams gets here," she said in a calm voice. Like she was talking down to her.

"Christ, you two really are cops. Calling mindbenders infovores is like calling a murder a… ten-forty-two or something, I dunno," Anne said while scratching her head.

Iris scoffed "Pretty shitty mind reader if you got caught, huh?"

Anne shrugged. "Never said I wasn't."

[Same/Alike].

Iris gritted her teeth. That had to just be Anne fucking with her. She hated it. Hated having a voice behind her own ears. "Shut up, will you? You're the one who set this whole thing up, aren't you?" She waved her gun accusatorily.

Anne put her hands up in mock surrender. "Well, duh. How else was I supposed to get that? Burned a lot of bridges with my old pals setting this whole things up." Anne rested a hand on her chin. "Though I suppose that won't matter much after today."

"Iris, can we all just… calm down a bit here? We shouldn't just be standing around like this," Jaqueline said in a pleading tone.

"Yeah, listen to your pal here. I didn't ditch the Insurgency just to get turned into a stain by some shrimp," Anne laughed.

[Clouding/Obscuring]. Other.

"Sh-Shrimpy? We're the same body type!" Once Iris was done saying that, she realized she wasn't really sure why she felt like she had to respond. Anne just laughed again.

Other.

"Wait, uh, Insurgency?" Jaqueline's eyes widened a bit once that finally clicked.

"Well, doy. How else was I supposed to feed both you guys and the Coalition the same bit? I will say, though, I wasn't expecting Alpha-Niner. I'm flattered," Anne said in a mock-appreciative tone.

Other.

Iris gnashed her teeth. Was that all that damn thing could say now? "And why the hell would you be telling us this, anyways?"

"Easy," Anne said as she pointed behind Iris. "I was stalling."

Son of a bitch. Iris whipped around just in time to see a seven-foot-tall woman down the hallway level a pistol at her.

Told. You.

She felt a sharp pain on the back of her hand as her ears started ringing from the sound of a gunshot in a closed concrete tunnel. Her legs moved without thinking, which was, in general, a good survival instinct for when a bullet takes a chunk of skin of your hand, but, due to the circumstances, only succeed in throwing her back into Jaqueline.

Both reacting to the gunshot and the impact, Jaqueline lost her grip on the cylinder - idiot - which Anne promptly grabbed and started busting ass down the hall with.

Iris threw her arms back at the unfamiliar sensation of contact, especially from her, only resuming her scramble when she felt a bullet smack her in the back. Her suit was made with ballistic fibers, and the bullet was hollow point, but it fucking hurt. She scrambled after Anne, who was rapidly rounding a corner.

"Got them, Spider! Tell Skunkboy to grow a pair and get down here!" Iris heard a man's voice from behind her but didn't bother looking back. There were at least two of them now, and Iris at least needed to make some space before trying anything smart.

Turning a corner, Iris saw Anne walking through a door - a door! - which she then started closing behind her. As Iris got closer to the door, she saw it was made out of thick metal, and that Anne was holding a ring of keys.

Uh oh.

Iris slammed herself into the door as Anne shut it, her hand shooting for the handle - it didn't budge. On the other side of the thick and narrow glass pane embedded in the door, Anne grinned at Iris and saluted her with two figners. Iris smacked the glass with the back of her hand while holding up her middle finger, but Anne turned and walked away. She walked. Spinning her keys around her finger and whistling. Bitch.

Outplayed. Disappointment.

Iris smacked her forehead with her palm. Yeah, that'll teach 'em.

[Me]. Unharmed.

Iris was considering more creative ways to hit herself in the head when she heard footsteps rapidly approaching and spun around to point her gun at them. It wasn't Coalition, though, just Jaqueline rounding the corner and pressing herself to the wall as though that would somehow make her invisible despite her height. "Uh, sir? Any ideas?"

"I told you not to call me that," Iris grumbled. She was getting really sick of Jaqueline's whole newbie schtick. "She got away with that thing that you were supposed to hold on to." Jaqueline's face dropped, but she didn't defend herself. Typical. Acting like she was just some poor little thing. "I need to get this door open, cover me."

"Uh, got it, sir," Jaqueline said as she peeked around the corner to see how close the two Coalition agents were. Luckily, she didn't have to look for very long, as the taller one absolutely fucking rocked Jaqueline's shit with her fist as soon as she stuck her head out around the corner.

Iris cursed and started leafing through her photos. From the back of the stack, she counted 27, 26, 25, and pulled out photo number 24. She could blow the door, but then she'd be shit out of luck for slowing down her pursuers, and she had shorter legs. Jaqueline better at least be good for giving me enough time to pick this, she thought.

Cornered. [Defeat/Surrender].

Pulling the lockpicks out and jamming them into the lock, Iris looked over her shoulder. Jaqueline was getting her fucking ass beat. Iris kind of assumed as much, with how much she liked to go on about how I'm a scientist by trade, but all that shit they put in her should at least let her eat the hits.

A particularly nasty haymaker from the Coalition agent forced Iris' attention back to the lock.

Inopportune.

First pin came easy. Iris heard the second Coalition agent catching up.

Second pin. Sounded like Jaqueline actually got a hit in.

Third pin. The man from before shouted something about backup.

Fourth pin. The blood on Iris' hand was making it harder to grab the pick.

Fifth pin. There was a click, and the door handle came unlocked.

Iris opened the door, and stepped into the doorway to hide behind the metal door. Looking back, she saw… Jaqueline actually got the Coalition agent into a headlock. Whaddaya know. It looked like she wasn't used to losing hand-to-hand engagements, as she was flinging her limbs about with a look of pure, unbridled rage on her face, but was still unable to get Jaqueline to budge.

"Hey, come on, we gotta-" Iris stopped yelling as she saw the other Coalition agent reading his gun and aiming it at Jaqueline.

"Kitten, hold still!" He barked. The seven-foot-tall woman went totally limp.

"Shit. Hey! Get over here!" Iris yelled. Jaqueline turned to look at the man aiming a gun at her, and just… dropped the woman and took a single step back. Didn't even try to make it to Iris.

For his part, the man didn't hesitate. As soon as he had a clear shot, he pulled the trigger. Jaqueline's head whipped back from the impact, a spurt of blood coming out, and the space around her head looked like shattered glass. In less then a second, the distortion enveloped her whole body before collapsing in on itself, and then she simply wasn't there.

Escape. Both.

While the Coalition agents were trying to process what just happened, Iris groaned and shut the door. Just like her to leave Iris all on her own. Iris locked the door and ran after Anne, not once looking back.

"Who's there?" Bullfrog's voice echoed from down the hallway.

"It's me! I got Skunkboy," Spider called out as she turned down the last flight of stairs, finally leaving Skunkboy's poor limping ass behind as she ran down the rest of the stairway. "You guys alright?"

"Fine, yeah. One possible UTE liquidation, though I'm not sure. Seems to be out of the picture for now," Bullfrog responded as Spider ran up to him. He looked over her shoulder. "Skunkboy alright?"

"Yeah, he's coming." Spider pointed over her shoulder with her thumb as Skunkboy staggered into the hallway, one hand on the wall to balance and one hand on his crotch. "KTE-11971 actually fucked him up pretty good. Are you guys alright?"

"Kitten got manhandled, but other than that, we're alright," said Bullfrog. Spider glanced at Kitten, and somehow, despite her neutral expression, she seemed to be absolutely seething. "She did hit KTE-11971, though. Blood's still fresh."

"Oh! Do you need me to get a link off that?" Spider pulled out her tablet. As long as she had access to something that had been a part of a person's body, she could do anything from hex them to even influencing weaker subjects. Blood was the best link to someone's body, aside from… a fluid that was much harder to get your hands on from someone you didn't know intimately.

"Yeah, it's right here," Bullfrog said as he walked Spider over to a few spots of blood on the ground, Skunkboy all but forgotten. "Just try to probe its memories some. We get some intel on that Foundation assault force, and this won't all be for nothing."

Spider nodded, and set about preparing the ritual. It was a simple one, mostly already done by the computing on her tablet, but she needed to draw out the runes she needed with the blood before it dried out. She put on a pair of latex gloves and started running between every puddle she could find, finger-painting with the blood to draw a rune she'd practiced a hundred times. Spider breathed a sigh of relief and muttered the necessary incantation. Alright, she had enough blood. All she had to do know was take a quick peak in the KTE.

She breathed in, then out, then in, slowing down her breathing as she shut her eyes. Spider felt herself get stretched out of her body like mozzarella cheese as the ritual pulled her closer to her target. She reached out, or some part of her did, to find an opening in her target's psyche. Lots of things were exploitable, Spider reminded herself as she examined the KTE's disembodied self from the outside. Formative memories, impactful relationships, driving desires, they all left bits of texture on the psyche.

Spider focused her attention on a significant irregularity. Something that large had a lot built off of it, and it seemed like it was frequently thought of. Recently thought of, too, so it likely had something relevant to the Foundation's mission. Spider carefully tugged on it, like pulling a loose thread to unravel fabric…

The entire thing rippled. Every part of it, like the KTE was reacting to Spider's presence. No, that shouldn't be possible. Spider's not new to this, she knew she'd done everything right. Nothing normal should be acting like that, Spider knew, and decided to pull herself back. Something was wrong.

As she tried to retreat back to her own body, a part of the KTE's psyche that Spider had pulled on… stuck to her somehow. Six years of studying Applied Sorcery, and nothing like that was ever mentioned. This was supposed to be a one-way deal. Beginning to panic, Spider tried ripping herself away, but felt herself sinking…

Harry gurgled as his intestines slid out of him, having been cut clean in half. God, no, Iris felt like she was going to pass out. Part of her brain kept telling her that wasn't Harry. Harry had gotten her ice cream last time they went out on an operation. Harry had legs and his insides on the inside.

Throwing that photo to the side as Able tore down the hall towards the squad holed up in the boiler room, Iris picked up another photo to see Able rip a door off its hinges. She wanted to stop, but she knew, she knew she could do something. Avery emptied her assault rifle into Able as he picked Johnathan up by the face and slammed him into a wall. Iris wanted to scream, but she could only make a barely audible noise as all the things that used to make up her friend slid down the wall. Her brain ran through all the things he'd never do again as her eyes started burning. She was really only starting to process it.

Iris looked to her side. There was a gun on the table. Adrian's revolver. He had showed her how to use it before he almost died, and she knew she could put it through the picture and kill Able in one, clean shot. She heard a shriek and looked back down at her photo and while she could barely see what was happening in the picture, but she recognized Avery's voice. God, please, no.

Adrian had said to use the gun on bad guys. Able was a bad guy. But she'd eaten dinner with him. She'd gone on road trips with him. They'd helped each other, before, on the rare few times the two Omega-7 teams would cooperate. She couldn't… she couldn't…

Able laughed when another squad ran into the room and opened fire. The same laugh he had when dealing with anomalies. Animals. And he was looking at his friends. Iris' friends.

Able looked around the room, shrugging off the bullets like rain. His eyes settled on the boiler, and Iris felt bile come up from her throat. At least leave something to bury, Iris wanted to say. Even her own family got that much from her.

She looked at the gun again. She could stop him. Maybe even save that squad if she was fast enough. But her stomach felt like pressurized vacuum pulling down her whole chest. She couldn't move. All she could do was look back at the photo as Able smashed the boiler with his blade, the pressure ripping the container to shreds like a frag bomb.

Iris wasn't sure what happened next, but a stabbing pain came to her right eye. She’d later learn that a piece of the boiler had flown through her photograph. Iris felt her back hit the floor as she brought both of her hands to her eye and screamed-

Spider's ears were ringing from the sound of a gunshot. Her hands shot up to her eyes, feeling a sharp phantom pain in one of them. At first, she thought maybe she really did hurt her eyes, but when she started blinking, she realized those were just tears.

She was lightheaded. She needed to slow down her breathing, to focus on something else. Taking shaky, deliberate breaths, Spider looked back at her tablet, which now had a bullet hole in it. Damn. She was going to get her ass chewed out for that.

"-then it'll come out of my fucking paycheck, alright?" Spider heard Skunkboy yell as she finally found herself able to refocus on her surroundings.

Seeing Spider begin to wake up, Skunkboy diverted his attention away from Bullfrog to crouch down next to her and offer her a bottle of water. "Spider? You alright?"

"Y-Yeah, I…" Spider stopped mid-sentence to take a sip of water with shaking hands. "I'm okay now."

"Are you sure?" Skunkboy was visibly shaken. It took a lot for him to lose his composure. "You were, like, gnashing your teeth and sobbing. I… We couldn't reach you."

"I, it's just," Spider struggled to find words as she turned to address Bullfrog. "The KTE, I don't know. Something about it was wrong, it's like it dragged me down with it. Like- Like it-"

"Spider, just breath." Bullfrog crouched down next to Skunkboy. He just looked morose. "She's a Green. I shouldn't have told you to link with her when we didn't know anything."

Spider tried to keep talking, but Bullfrog held up a hand. "Alright. We're down one and a half men with unknown anomalies. I'm pulling us out. Mission's a wash."

Spider wanted to say something, but there was a lump in her throat forming now that the adrenaline was wearing of. Kitten led the way, and Bullfrog waited for Skunkboy to wrap Spider's arm around his shoulders to help her walk. Once they got going, it became clear that Skunkboy was still limping badly, but Spider decided to just let him have this one.

Iris could feel the metal of the revolver in her hand now, pressing indentations into her skin from her uncomfortably tight grip even though she barely noticed. She had it. She had the gun now.

Illusion. Memory.

God, even the walls looked the same. Concrete and piping, just missing the red film. Iris could still hear the containment breach sirens as she staggered along. She had to move. She had to… Had to… get somewhere.

No, no, the sirens weren't real. That was years ago. It wouldn't happen again. She had the gun now. She always had the gun now. Dragging herself forward on the wall, she kept telling herself it wouldn't happen again.

Any rationalization she had was pushed out of her head by constricting fear when she heard footsteps approach. Iris squeezed Adrian's revolver even harder as she pointed it forwards. She had it this time. She'd pull the trigger this time.

Stop. Illusion.

"Shut up, shut up, shut up," Iris muttered under her breath. She knew what she had to do as she saw the face that rounded the corner. All smiles, but she had died. Iris had watched it. Just like Able. Just like him, just like him, people shouldn't come back. Nobody who deserved it did. She wasn't going to make the same mistake twice. Her finger quaked around the double-action trigger, struggling to pull through. The fear constricted her stomach, her lungs, and her fingers.

It took Jackie a second to process that she had just been shot at, and another two to realize it had come from Iris. She turned around to see what Iris was shooting at, but there was nothing there. Not even the sound of footsteps down the hall.

A choking noise pulled her attention back to Iris. The hammer on her revolver was moving back, but the gun was uncharacteristically shaky in her hands. Her face was twisted up in a way Jackie hadn't ever seen before, but even worse were her eyes. She looked terrified. Her eyes were screaming and looking right through Jackie. Like she wasn't even there.

"Sir." Jackie tried talking in a low, nonthreatening voice. "Sir, it's me. It's Jaqueline."

Bang. Iris's whole body jerked along with the recoil of the shot, as though she hadn't been expecting it. Jackie felt the bullet pass through her hair.

"Iris. Please." Jackie felt her mouth start to turn dry. "It's me. It's Jackie. I just happened to get back faster this time, I promise. It's me." Iris seized up, finger pulling on the trigger again, hammer pulling back.

"I don't want to go back, sir." Jackie's voice broke a little. "It's really lonely out there."

The hammer stopped. Iris started blinking, then looking around as though taking in her surroundings. She lowered her gun, taking in rapid, deep breaths. Jackie felt herself relax a little.

"Sir, are you, um… Is that you there?"

Iris' head snapped up. "Yes. Yes. I'm okay. I'm okay now." She seemed to be talking more to herself than to Jackie, still shaking with a visible sheen of sweat.

Jackie saw Iris' gun, now held limp in her hand, had a layer of smeared blood on it. Jackie cursed when she saw the gash on the back of Iris' hand. She was in charge of first aid, she reminded herself while taking a cautious step towards Iris. "Sir, your hand-"

Iris didn't seem to really be paying attention to what was happening, but as soon as Jackie touched her hand, she jumped, yanking her arm away. "Don't touch me!"

They were both still for a moment, but Jackie stepped back. "Sorry, sir. Just… please try to at least dress the wound first.

Iris pressed her lips together, but nevertheless pulled bandages and disinfectant from one of her photos, trying to force her hands to stop shaking. "We need to catch up to Anne," she said, commanding tone covering up the clear discomfort she was feeling from cleaning the wound. "Only one way out of here, it opens up into a construction site. Should be deserted at this time of day, so we'll corner her there." She sounded like she was trying to force her words out as she jammed the photo into her back pocket.

Jackie balked. "Sir, clearly something happened back there." Iris scowled, but Jackie continued. "Adams and Foxx aren't even close, we should just-"

"Shut up!" Iris' voice broke. "Just do what I say."

"I…" Iris was unstable right now. Short of picking her up and carrying her away, Jackie didn't think she'd listen to her. She'd probably run off and get herself killed. "…Alright, sir. I'm with you."

Iris just nodded, and pushed past Jackie to continue walking, like she didn't want to let Jackie see her face anymore.

"I'm with you, okay?" Jackie called out. "Just remember that."

Iris paused for a moment, but didn't look back.