Author: Bulgroz the Third
Title: The Adjusters #30 - Aftermath
Keywords: MF, mc
Posted: July 2, 2012
Edited: July 2, 2012




			  The Adjusters #30


			      Aftermath



"This morning, North Alexandria Interim Police Chief Flaherty gave a
press conference detailing the results of their investigation of the
explosion and fire that destroyed the Delta Iota Kappa fraternity
house on Fraternity Row."

Daniel looked up towards the television hanging high on the ceiling of
the university dining hall, the same hall where he and Jenn and Serena
and Radhu had shared many a meal, a lifetime ago. Was it masochism, or
a return to a safe environment? He wanted to feel the presence of
people around him, but at the same time was repelled by the thought of
interacting with anyone. He sat alone at his table, a sandwich half
eaten in front of him. The lunch crowd had thinned noticeably.

Jenn. Serena. Radhu. Gone, all of them. The Three Musketeers they were
no longer. Serena had been caught in the fire at the frat house. Radhu
had been found dead in his apartment--Daniel still could not believe
it--heart attack, he had been told, and no evidence of foul play. And
then Cindy. Her body had been identified in the burnt-out husk of his
apartment, one more victim of the several fires that had ravaged the
city.

And as for Jenn... The police had appeared at the hotel he was staying
earlier that morning to inform him that his fiancee had been
identified in the remains of a car crash at the bottom of a cliff
towards the lake, away from the campus. They did not know how or why
she lost control of the vehicle, but they believed she died on impact,
her body smashed beyond recognition. Dental records had to be used to
perform the identification. He had stared at the cops--one of them too
young to be delivering such awful news--who could not stay long
because of the chaos that had engulfed the town.

In one fell swoop, everyone he was close to was gone. He felt numb.

"The destruction of the fraternity has been called the worst disaster
in the county's history, if not the entire state. Nearly two hundred
bodies were recovered from the fire site. Darnell President James
Calhoun is believed to be among the victims, as are several
influential alumni of both the University and the fraternity. Details
are being withheld until victim identification is completed. Interim
Chief Flaherty indicated that the preliminary investigation pointed to
a gas explosion, linked to the city-wide power outage experienced by
the city two nights ago, were the cause of the fire. As to why no one
was able to escape the fire, alcohol and drugs are pursued as possible
explanations. Outraged parents have been calling for renewed
enforcement of anti-intoxication laws, and civil suits for wrongful
deaths against the University and the national Delta Iota Kappa
fraternity are expected to be filed within the coming days."

Death. So much death. And Daniel had blood on his hands, too. He had
let Biff die. He could have saved him--maybe--but he did not. The guy
was a bastard, there was no doubt about it. But did he deserve to die?
Did anyone?

"In related news, firefighters are still busy dealing with the
aftermath of several fires across town and on Darnell University's
East Campus, believed to be related to the same gas line problems
suspected in the Delta Iota Kappa fraternity fire. Three deaths have
been reported due to those fires. Representatives from the New England
Gas and Power company have not commented beyond a press release
stating that 'they were doing everything possible to ascertain the
source of the leaks,' and reassuring the public that no further danger
to public safety is expected. The North Alexandria Fire Department,
unwilling to take any more chances, has ordered the company to suspend
gas distribution until the system could be examined by hand, a process
that may take several weeks."

Several fires across town. Three deaths. Cindy one of them. And
possibly Doctor Cargyle, as Ryder Hall, where he had been hiding, had
been destroyed by the fire that had raged through East Campus,
believed to have started at the power station next to the abandoned
building. Daniel had raced to Ryder the day following the Delta Iota
Kappa explosion, hoping that the doctor might help him locate Jenn,
only to find destruction. And of course, in the end, nothing
mattered. Jenn was gone.

He felt the presence before he saw the shadow cast upon the
table. "Agent Shawbank," he said without turning around.

"Mister Malcolm," she acknowledged, after a beat. "May I sit down?"

Daniel shrugged. "Sure." He kept looking up at the television. From
the corner of his eye, he watched the raven-haired woman take a seat
at his table. She wore exactly what she wore at their last meeting,
and what he had seen her wear the few times he had seen her watch
him--a long black leather duster over a black pantsuit.

She remained silent, and Daniel was in no hurry to start up any
conversation, and thus they stared in silence as the newscaster
detailed the suicide of Police Chief Henry Roberts by self-inflicted
gunshot wound in his own home, as well as the disappearance of Police
Officer Sonya Gonzales.

"We caught Doctor Cargyle," said Shawbank.

Daniel glanced at her. She was still watching the television
set. Around them, students were circulating, talking, laughing,
generally acting like this was a normal day, as if they had not been
affected by the disaster, as if they had not lost loved ones in the
tragedy.

"Ah. I wondered what had happened to him." He knew he should have
cared more, since the doctor was the one person that could help Jenn,
but she was gone--they were all gone--and he had no energy left to
deal with any of it.

"We found him in an abandoned building on campus."

On the television, the newscaster was talking about the fatal car
crash during the night in the cliffs near the lake that had claimed
the life of a young woman, identified to be a student at Darnell
University, an additional loss for a community already
shattered. Jenn, he thought. He felt his eyes tear up.

A young man at a nearby table was looking at Shawbank, a winning smile
on his face, and he rose, keeping his eyes on her. She turned her head
to look at him, and he stopped just as he was taking a step towards
Daniel's table, suddenly unsure of himself. Shawbank stared at the
young man until he sat back down trying to look nonchalant. "Someone
left him cuffed up for us," she continued, not noticing or not paying
attention to Daniel's emotions.

Daniel took a moment to compose himself, thinking of how pointless all
of it was. "Good thing you found him when you did, then. Seems those
abandoned buildings on campus are dangerous these days..."

She met Daniel's gaze, and Daniel was once more struck by the
steel-grey eyes that seemed to stare coldly into his soul. "Indeed,"
she said, simply. She did not smile.

Daniel sighed, and turned his attention back to the television. "Why
are you here, Agent Shawbank? You're not just paying a social call to
let me know that you caught your man..."

Shawbank looked at him with her glacial stare for several long beats,
before seeming to come to a decision. "I'm attached to the FBI as a
special consultant. I specialize in, shall we say, esoteric cases, of
the kind exemplified by Doctor Thaddeus Cargyle."

"Mind control," said Daniel, without emotion, matching Shawbank's
tone.

"Yes. The company I work for has a certain expertise on the subject,
and they lend a hand to the authorities when needed."

When Daniel did not react to her statement, she looked at him for a
while longer before continuing. "I have been tracking him for nearly
two years now. I lost his trail a year ago in Boston. It took more
than six months for him to make a mistake, but he made one, and that
was enough."

Daniel could not help the calculation in his mind. A year ago. Add six
month, that would make it...

"The brouhaha with NADA. Marjorie."

Shawbank gave a sharp node. "It fit. A small isolated town and access
to state-of-the-art research facilities. Exactly what he would be
looking for."

"So you know about Delta Iota Kappa." It was not a question.

Shawbank looked at him for a while longer before returning to scanning
the crowd. "The fraternity president, one Kevin Cusker, agreed to
shelter the doctor and to provide him with lab equipment in exchange
for the use of the doctor's skills. Girls were abducted and
conditioned into sexual servitude while maintaining a normal daytime
cover. The doctor was at the Fraternity Row house until the end of
December, when he went deep into hiding again."

Daniel nodded. Cindy had told him that Kevin had been upset at the
doctor disappearing without a trace. Had it not been for Biff dragging
Daniel into the whole sordid affair by taking Jenn, the doctor might
be hiding still. He was the link. Which meant...

"You followed me to the building where Cargyle was hiding, didn't
you?"

Shawbank never answered the question. "Mister Malcolm, my company
believe that you would be an asset. They have asked me to extend you
an offer, when you graduate."

Daniel fought back the urge to laugh out loud. Graduation? That was
furthest from his mind right now. It was pointless, like so many other
things. Jenn would not graduate. Serena would not graduate. Radhu
would not graduate. Cindy would not graduate.

But he did not laugh. He stared at the half-eaten sandwich on his
tray, noticing that the mayonnaise had an unhealthy yellow tinge to
it. "Why?" he eventually asked. He was not quite sure what the
question meant himself.

"You proved your investigative abilities. I would not have found
Cargyle without you."

"I didn't do any of it, you know." And indeed, he did not. Serena had
done much of the leg work while searching for Marjorie the previous
semester, and then Radhu had been the driving force in looking for
Jenn and Biff and then Cargyle.

"Investigation is as much about discovering small details as it is
perseverance in assembling the larger picture hinted at by those small
details. You had a support system, which you used effectively."

Daniel had the feeling he had just been complimented, although
Shawbank's cool tone and facial expression never changed. He looked at
her. She was beautiful, despite the aloofness of her
expression. "That's one way to look at things," he said. I failed, and
lost everything. How's that for effectiveness, Agent Shawbank?

She turned to look at him, their eyes meeting once again. She seemed
to read into his soul. "Mister Malcolm. You have seen firsthand what
people like Cargyle can do. You have seen the pain, the suffering, the
agony that can be unleashed. We're offering you a chance to make a
difference. You can help us catch those monsters. Because they are out
there, Mister Malcolm. Cargyle was but one of many. With your help, we
can find them, catch them, and eliminate them."

Shawbank had shown more emotion in that tirade than Daniel suspected
she was comfortable in exhibiting, because she stopped and pursed her
lips and went back to scanning the crowd.

Daniel had no energy to think about the scale Shawbank was
suggesting. More people like Cargyle? More people like Kevin and Biff
and the rest of those bastards? And Jenn was still gone. And Serena
and Radhu and Cindy were still dead.

"You have my card," Shawbank said, standing up. "Call me after you
think about it."

Daniel did not watch her go, unlike many of the men in the cafeteria.


				* * *


Eve Shawbank entered her hotel room, her mind sifting through various
post-operative facts, not attending to a single one of them in
particular, just watching thoughts and ideas and feelings stream
through. A very Zen way of approaching life, one of her colleagues had
told her once in an atypical moment of closeness. Shawbank did not
know anything about that, and had no interest in learning either. All
she knew is that it was the only way for her to deal with the world,
to escape and recover. Not that she would ever let anyone know about
that.

Her earpiece clicked twice, letting her know that Brisecoeur was on
the encrypted line. "Just got the report that all operatives have left
the area. No issues. Everything looks clean from this end."

Shawbank nodded. She looked around the bare room. Picked up a small
travel bag from the chair in the corner. "Good. Let's go before the
heat picks up."

"Heat? Really?" She could hear the mocking tone in Brisecoeur's
voice. "From those idiots on the police force? They couldn't find
their big toe in the dark without a flashlight."

Shawbank could not disagree with Brisecoeur's assessment. Even by the
standards of small-town police, the law enforcement officials in this
town had been particularly bumbling at every step. That Police Chief
Roberts had an arrangement with the Delta Iota Kappa fraternity
without a doubt helped in that respect. Things would have been more
difficult to pull off in New York or Chicago.

"The Interim Chief called in the State Police. They will bring the
heat." She started grabbing the few pieces of clothing she had put in
drawers, packing her bag.

"Oh. Right. Yeah, okay." She could hear Brisecoeur's finger fly over
his keyboard through the earpiece. "Well, the final reports are
in. Twenty-eight girls. I've triple-checked with the data I pulled out
of Cargyle's computer, and that's all of them--all the girls he
affected--if you count Duquesne, which we were able to track down in
Bangkok, and Caprese, who kicked the bucket with Unit Echo."

Shawbank groaned. Unit Echo dying in that fire had been an
annoyance. They had recovered the bodies, of course, leaving Caprese's
body to be found by the authorities, but she had no particularly
satisfying explanation for the death of the two operatives. Somehow,
Caprese must have put up enough of a fight that Unit Echo was caught
in the explosion they had been ordered to arrange to eliminate the
evidence of Caprese's termination.

"Thirty girls," confirmed Shawbank. "All accounted for." Thirty-one,
corrected Shawbank internally. Jennifer Hansen, Malcolm's fiancee, had
not been accounted for in Doctor Cargyle's files, because he did not
know of her conditioning. Cusker and Tilling had done it all on their
own, without telling anyone. She had been found dead earlier this
morning, according to police information bulletins. Car accident.

Shawbank kept that information to herself. She would have been hard
pressed to explain why exactly, except for pointing out a lifetime of
not divulging information until it was strictly necessary to do so,
until she understood exactly what game was in play and how the
information she had could be useful to her. Jennifer Hansen was an
unknown quantity. Because Daniel Malcolm was an unknown quantity.

As if he was reading her mind, Brisecoeur spoke up. "So did you do it?
What Control asked?"

"Of course," she scoffed, closing up her travel bag and sliding her
tablet computer in the side sleeve. "It's Control."

"And? What did he say?"

"Malcolm did not accept, but did not refuse either."

Brisecoeur was getting agitated. "So Control's seriously thinking of
giving Malcolm a job in IE Division? That's nuts!"

"Feel free to take that up with Control."

Brisecoeur sputtered something incomprehensible, then sighed. "No, of
course not. Still. It's just such a bad idea, it's... it's..." He did
not complete his sentence.

"For the record, I don't think Malcolm is interested."

"Bad idea... bad idea..." repeated Brisecoeur.

Bad idea is right, she thought. But Control was Control, and one did
not argue with Control. At least not to his face. She would find a way
to get her point across. In the meantime, she had a flight to catch,
and a debriefing back at Headquarters to get ready for.

Time to leave Bumfuck, New England.


				* * *


It was the end of day when Daniel approached the cordoned-off area and
slipped under the police yellow tape. Beyond, the ruins of what up
until two days earlier had been the Delta Iota Kappa fraternity house
lay in ruins that he could not help but think should be
smoldering. They were not. But they were ruins.

Daniel stared, trying to wrap his head around everything that had
happened. As if in silent testimony to the loss that had occurred in
this place, nature itself remained quiet--only the sound of wind in
the trees or the rare cry of a bird or the rustling of a squirrel in
the nearby shrubs betrayed life.

What the fuck am I supposed to do now? he wondered. Take the rest of
the semester off? Ask for a leave of absence because of the tragedy?
Travel to the Himalayas to find himself? Graduate and take that job in
Texas he had been offered months earlier? Take Shawbank's job offer?
Get drunk and try to forget the world? The problem was, none of it
sounded even remotely interesting. Including doing nothing. He did not
want things to be different--he wanted himself to be different--to be
someone else, thinking someone else's thoughts, feeling someone else's
feelings.

The soft crunching of twigs from behind him intruded on his
meditation. A man came to stand beside him, staring at the ruins of
the house. He was wearing a trench coat that had seen better days, a
hat that would have not have looked out of place on Daniel's
great-grandfather, and held an old unlit cigar in his mouth.

Daniel shot him a glance.

"Such a waste," said the man.

Daniel did not add to the comment.

"I want you to know, Mister Malcolm. that I'm very sorry not to have
gotten here in time," said the man after a long pause.

Daniel turned to look at the man. "Do I know you?"

The man pocketed his cigar. "My name is Sam O'Neill."

The name sounded familiar to Daniel. Where had he heard it before?

"I'm a private investigator. You called me back in January? Your
fiancee had gone missing, under--shall we say--strange circumstances?"

Of course. O'Neill, the private investigator from--where? Boston?
Philadelphia? No, New York City--that Radhu had said had a reputation
as the go-to person when looking for people going missing after
exhibiting odd behavior.

"As I said, Mister Malcolm," continued O'Neill, after seeing all of
the above play out on Daniel's face, "I'm sorry I could not get here
in time."

"Could you have prevented this?"

O'Neill shrugged. "Can't ever tell, can we?"

"Well, the story turned out to be a bit more complicated than you
think, Mister O'Neill."

"Please, call me Sam. And no, the story was pretty much exactly as
complicated as I feared it would be."

"Oh. And what do you know of the story?"

"It's a story with two tales. In the first tale, we have a crazed
scientist helping a fraternity acquire sexual slaves in exchange for
protection using technology that has no right to exist. In the second
tale, we have a frustrated college boy with deep-seated issues taking
a liking to a beautiful girl engaged to another man, and using the
aforementioned technology to steal the girl and use her for his
perverted needs. The two tales finally clash into a climax the result
of which we have before of us today."

O'Neill smiled at Daniel' reaction.

"Your blonde girlfriend read me the CliffsNotes," continued
O'Neill. "Although I could have guessed the main lines of the first
tale. The second tale was a bit more interesting, although not
entirely unpredictable if you take into account the psychology of the
folks involved. I'm sorry about your Indian friend."

"What do you mean, my blonde girlfriend?"

"Miss Caprese? I grabbed her from your place when those goons tried to
snatch her."

"Cindy? But... but she's dead. They found her body... they identified
her..."

"They identified her using her dental records. Dental records can be
switched, by the right person, for the right price. Once you switch
the records with those of a handy cadaver that you happen to have
laying around, well... In any case, I assure you--Miss Caprese is
alive and well."

"Where?"

"I'll give you the hotel and room number. It took some work to keep
her from running to you, Mister Malcolm. But I couldn't chance it
until now. But before I tell you, we probably should talk."

"What about?" Daniel was only half listening. Not everyone was dead,
he exulted. Cindy's alive!

"A lot, actually. To start, I hear you have received a job offer
earlier today."

Daniel was surprised. "How do you know what?"

O'Neill ignored the question. "Are you thinking of accepting?"

Daniel looked O'Neill in the eye, trying to get a sense of the older
man. Eventually, he shrugged. "I don't know. To be honest, I haven't
thought that far. And since I can't really make up my mind, I suspect
that the answer will be no."

"May I suggest you take the job, Mister Malcolm. It may help you
reunite with your fiancee."

Daniel turned around and stared at O'Neill, who was looking back at
him calmly. "She's gone, Sam." He emphasized the name,
dismissively. How dared he talk about Jenn that way? "Dead. Car
accident, last night. While she was running away from all this. She's
gone. They're all gone. Look around. Can't you smell the bodies
burning still?"

O'Neill remained calm. "Nothing is quite as it seems."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"This, for instance, was no accident." He stared at the wreckage of
the house.

"What?"

"Tell me what happened the night of the fire. You were there."

Daniel hesitated. He bit back the answer he had at the ready. He tried
to read O'Neill's face, searching for signs of deceit. But all Daniel
saw was patience--patience, and understanding. The man looked older
than he had seemed at first, was probably in his late forties.

"Why should I trust you?" O'Neill had said that Cindy was alive, and
had implied that Jenn was as well. Was any of it true?

"You shouldn't. You shouldn't trust anybody. But telling me what you
saw doesn't imply trust."

Daniel told his story. Of attending DIK-Bash with Jackson, of looking
for Jenn and Kyra, of finding Biff, of being captured by Biff, of the
murder of Kevin, of escaping during the power failure, of the
black-clad men attacking, of finding Biff, fighting Biff, losing
Jenn. O'Neill listened to everything without saying a word, merely
nodding a few times at salient points of the story.

When he was done, Daniel waited, while O'Neill stood thinking. The
older man had pulled his cigar out of his pocket and was munching on
the end.

"Now it's your turn. Why do you say this wasn't an accident? What
happened to Jenn? Is she alive?"

"The frat house was set on fire. It was no accident."

"But why?"

"Spring cleaning, some may call it. Getting rid of a group of people
that had the potential of becoming extremely embarrassing. And to get
rid of the evidence."

"What evidence?"

"Evidence of what had been done to the girls."

"What?" The connections were forming in Daniel's head. "The black-clad
men, shooting everyone. Cindy. They sent people for her?"

"They did. I helped her take care of them. Left a body in exchange so
that they'd think her dead."

"Who? Who did this?"

"That's a very good question, Mister Malcolm. A very good question."

"And Jenn?"

O'Neill was thoroughly destroying the end of his cigar, spitting out
shreds of tobacco leaves on the ground.

"I found her car slammed into a tree down on the side of Route 4 two
miles from the frat house. The car was registered to Balthazar
Cusker. It was empty."

"How did... how did you know to look for it?"

"While I was out helping Miss Caprese, I had eyes on the house. They
spotted a girl matching your fiancee's description appear out of
nowhere in the parking lot and get in the car and leave. They
followed. They lost it on that stretch of Route 4. I went back the
next morning, found the car where it had lost control. It was pretty
much invisible from the road, unless you paid attention to the skid
marks."

"It was empty?"

"Yes. I knew who the driver was, based on the description that Miss
Caprese had given me, and I figured she might need the same protection
that Miss Caprese had obtained. So I arranged a little staged accident
at a more convenient location."

"But the body? I mean, they identified..." Daniel paused when he saw
the look on O'Neill's face. "Of course. Dental records."

O'Neill nodded.

"So where is she?" asked Daniel, trying to keep the trepidation from
his voice. Jenn was alive?

"That I do not know, Mister Malcolm. All I do know is that she walked
away from that first car crash, as alive as you and me." O'Neill
munched on his cigar, calm, his hands in his trench coat's pockets.

Daniel digested that information, trying to quell the rise of hope
that was swelling in his chest. He only had this man's word for
it. "Why did you say that me taking the job might help me find Jenn?"

"What do you know about the offer?"

"Not much, really. Agent Eve Shawbank--she consults with the FBI--told
me that her company was interested in hiring me. She's been..." He
paused, again unsure of what he should tell O'Neill.

"She's been looking for Doctor Thaddeus Cargyle, the man suspected to
be behind the technology to enslave the girls."

"Yes. And she told me that her company helps find people that do that,
find people that... well... enslaves women like that, and stop them."

O'Neill nodded, without saying a word.

"Is that true?"

"It's not false." O'Neill put his cigar back in his
pocket. "Shawbank--" he said the word with almost a sneer, "works for
ADCorp."

"ADCorp?"

"ADCorp. The largest company you've never heard of. They have their
hands in so many cookie jars it's a full-time job keeping track of how
many cookies they're grasping, from industrial chemistry to
pharmacology to defense contracting."

"And...?"

"Let's just say that I would like to have someone on the inside that
can keep me abreast of interesting developments."

"You want me to take the job because you need a spy on the inside?"

"No. I want you to take the job because Doctor Thaddeus Cargyle was a
researcher with ADCorp until two years ago, when he disappeared."
O'Neill let that information sink in. "If you want to understand what
happened to your fiancee and how to help her, then that's where you
need to start. It just so happens that we can help each other, Mister
Malcolm."

"How?"

"You take the job, you go in, and you keep your ears and eyes
open. And once in a while, we chat."

"And how will you help me?"

"I will help you find your fiancee, of course. Free of charge. I am a
private investigator, after all. And a pretty darn good one at that."

"Why are you doing this?"

"Why does anyone do anything?"


				* * *


"So," Cindy asked Daniel after a long pause, "are you going to take
it?"

She was sitting on the sofa in her hotel suite, while Daniel stood
leaning against the wall opposite her. He had been pacing while giving
her a rundown of the events at the Delta Iota Kappa fraternity house,
a more detailed variant of the story he had told O'Neill. Cindy had
listened carefully, with eyes widening at all the important plot
points--at Kevin's brutal killing, at Biff's treatment of Serena and
Kyra, at the death of Jackson, at the invasion by the black-clad
commandos, at the face-off with Biff down in the bootlegging tunnel.

When he had arrived at the hotel that O'Neill had told him after their
meeting, Cindy had been there, waiting for him. She had practically
choked him off with a hug when he opened the door. There were tears in
her eyes. There were tears in his as well.

She had told him what had happened to her, how two black-clad
men--clearly the same people that had swarmed into the frat house--had
stalked her out in the apartment only to be neutralized by this man,
O'Neill, who snatched her away and kept her safe for two days. She had
wanted to get in touch with Daniel as soon as she was safe, but
O'Neill had kept her from communicating "until the coast was clear,"
he had said, somewhat mysteriously.

She had wanted to know about the events at the Delta Iota Kappa
costume party--whether he had found Jenn and Kyra and what had
happened with Biff and Jackson. He had told her everything that had
happened to him.

And now, after Daniel had recounted his own encounter with O'Neill,
Cindy had asked the question that had been bugging him ever since
leaving the fire site, at least the question he kept playing with to
avoid thinking about what he really wanted to think about but about
which he could do nothing.

"That's the question, Cin." He started pacing again. "O'Neill believes
that ADCorp is involved in this whole story. That they were looking
for Cargyle. That they're the ones that stormed the frat house to
clean up the mess that Cargyle made."

"But why?"

"Well, if any of it's true, including the fact that Cargyle used to
work for them, as O'Neill claims, then maybe they're the one that
developed the technology that Cargyle used, and they wanted it
back. And eliminate any evidence in the process. I mean, you said so
yourself, Cargyle was hiding from somebody. He knew they were hunting
him down, to try to stop him. And I guess they did."

"So they got him, eliminated the fraternity that harbored him,
including all the girls that had been brainwashed and everyone that
was involved. Radhu too? Do you think they responsible too?" She
looked up when a thought crossed her mind. "You said the guys at the
frat spoke of police protection. The police chief committed suicide
yesterday. Do you think...?"

"They killed two hundred people in that frat house. I wouldn't put
anything past them."

"I'm so sorry about Radhu, Dan. I don't know what to say."

Daniel nodded, acknowledging. He had not really dealt with it
yet. With any of it. "As near as I can tell, I'm the only loose end."
He looked at her meaningfully.

She completed the thought. "Of course. They think I'm dead."

"Everybody thinks your dead."

"O'Neill is working to get me a new identity."

They remained silent for a while.

Cindy asked the obvious question. "But if any of it is true, then why
would they want to hire you?"

"Well, I can think of a few reasons. One, Shawbank told me the truth,
and they want me to help them track down bad guys, and they think I'm
safe because I know what's going on. Two, they want to keep me close
because they're worried I'm going to cause them problems, and if I'm
close they can keep an eye on me. Three, we're wrong about what
happened, and Shawbank has nothing to do with any of it and she was
really here to apprehend Cargyle and she got him and I helped and that
makes me interesting."

Cindy digested it all. She twirled one of her blonde strands while she
thought. "What's O'Neill's beef with ADCorp?"

"He said it was personal. That he would explain everything later, but
that it was safer for me the less I knew. He did say something about
paying special attention to any reference to a group he called The
Adjusters."

"The Adjusters?"

"That's what he said. Didn't provide more details."

"Tall, brooding, and mysterious, that Sam O'Neill."

"I take it he didn't tell you much either?"

"No. He mostly questioned me about what I knew of the fraternity and
the stuff that happened in the last year. He knew a lot, but not
everything."

Daniel stared out of the window, thinking.

Cindy waited for several minutes, then stood up and approached
him. She wrapped her arms around him and hugged him. And asked the
question he had been dreading. "And what about Jenn?"

He squeezed her arm, trying to keep the deep emotions from his
voice. "She's alive, Cin." And he told her what O'Neill had told
him. Of course, he only had the private investigator's word about the
events, but part of him wanted so much to believe it that he was
willing to disregard rationality. "I've got to find her," he
concluded.

"I know." She headed to her bag, pulled out a thumb drive. "Here."

"What is it?"

"It's my first pass at the data that Radhu collected from the frat's
computers, the stuff that was encrypted. I cracked it. And isolated a
lot of stuff from Jenn. And from Biff. Mostly emails, to you and to
other people. I didn't get to all of them, and for many of those that
I read, I'm not entirely sure you want to read them either. Or watch
the videos. But there are some things that might be interesting, and
possibly relevant. I've isolated and marked up what I think you should
look at."

"Great. Thanks..." He took the drive. He did not know how to broach
the next topic, but he knew he had to. "Cin... a while back you asked
me... about us..."

She looked up at him, her big blue eyes seeming to stare deep into his
soul.

"Well..." he continued, found he could not. "I've got to find her."

Her eyes still on his, she smiled--did he imagine the melancholy he
saw in that smile? "I know," she said, softly. She closed her eyes. "I
meant it," she said, "when I told you that I didn't want to get
between you and Jenn."

"Still..."

"Look, Dan. I'm not dumb. I know what she means to you. I mean, I've
looked at you risk everything to find her, and you can't fake
that. I've seen how your whole world lit up this week when you figured
out what was going on and saw a way to get her back. I won't lie to
you--I want a guy that would do that for me. It'd be nice. Then
again," and she grinned, "I also want a guy that will push me around
and force me to do all sort of filthy things. Point is, I'm okay if
you're not the guy that does that for me. You love her. And I know you
care about me. And you know what? That's good enough for me right
now. I'm happy to be your friend."

"You are? Friends. That's it?"

Her grin never left her face. "Well, I was sort of
thinking... friends, with benefits?" She ran her hand down his chest,
and under his shirt. "You have my medallion, and it's kind of the key
to my kink right now, at least until I work out my... issues. And I've
got years of pent-up sexual needs that want addressing. Now, I could
go around and offer that medallion to every other guy I meet, but
honest, it's you I trust with it. Sex, with no strings
attached. That's what I'm offering. And what you're getting is someone
ready to do whatever it is that you wish, no matter how dirty. And
fully happy to do it. What so you say?"

"And when I get Jenn back?"

"Then if you want me to, I'll fade away into that good night. Or you
can just use me as your serving wench, both of you. I'd be more than
happy to do Jenn's bidding as well as yours..."

"Cin!"

Cindy pushed herself on her tiptoes. "Kidding," she said softly, "or
kindda..." She kissed him, a kiss that started as a soft touch of lips
on lips before quickly turning into a passionate exchange of desire
and lust. Cindy pressed herself against Daniel, a moan escaping her
lips.

Daniel let himself go into the embrace, letting go of his guilt, of
his shame, of the pain of the last few days, all in one go. Embrace
the day. Embrace the hope. Jenn's alive. Cindy's alive. He grasped
Cindy tighter, the need for solace and company raging strong, the
tension of the last few days sublimating into an erection that was
pushing into Cindy's stomach, a state which she must have felt because
she rubbed her body against it with the unmistakable goal to entice it
to greater hardness.

He pulled out of the kissed, looking at her in the eyes, and while
keep his expression carefully neutral, he reached for his wallet and
slipped out a folded piece of paper.

He handed it over to Cindy.

Her eyes grew wide when she saw it, and a slow smile lit up her
face. She took it with trembling hands, and opened it, as if to
confirm what it was, even though she clearly recognized it on
sight. Inside, seven simple words. Good for one blow job, anytime,
anywhere. Signed with her name. The folded piece of paper that she
gave him for his birthday, weeks ago. The one that had seemed to
herald the roller-coaster that had been his life since.

Cindy looked at him. "Now?" Her voice had a slight tremble. She knew
what this meant. That he was okay with the arrangement. Friends with
benefits, she had said. He could live with that. When he got Jenn
back, they would figure out where everyone stood.

She went to her purse, sitting on the floor by the entrance to the
room. She pulled out her medallion.

"How did it survive the fire?" he asked, puzzled.

"Do you think I'd leave it behind?"

She came back to Daniel with the bronze medallion hanging on its
leather string, holding it almost reverently. She held it out to
him. There was something official to the exchange. Daniel had to
comment on it, to dissipate some of the aura of seriousness. "It's
almost like a ceremony," he joked.

"It is, in a way. I'm yours, Dan. To do with as you wish. For as long
as you wish." She looked him in the eyes before looking down. Daniel
almost expected her to drop to her knees. He had to admit that the
thought was at once intriguing and arousing.

He took the medallion, and slipped it over his head. He saw Cindy
shiver noticeably as the heavy pendant settled on his chest. He still
did not quite understand how the medallion worked. Cindy did not seem
to really know either, but she told him that it lifted all of her
inhibitions--not only those natural ones that everyone had, but more
importantly for her even those unnatural ones that had been plaguing
her since puberty, those that kept her from opening herself to her own
sexuality. She also believed that it removed much of her free will
along the way, although she remained fully conscious of what she was
doing. Which to Daniel meant that what he had around his neck was a
heavy responsibility. He did not particularly care for it, but it
seemed necessary to Cindy, and he did care for her. And she did help
him. And he needed the company, the comfort, the love. Did that make
him selfish? So be it.

Cindy was looking at him expectantly. In the past, when he had put the
medallion on, she had wasted no time to jump on him. Not this
time. She was waiting. Letting him drive. Letting him take control. He
shook his head. Silly girl. "Cin," he said. "Please strip."

In a flash, Cindy reached down and pulled her shirt over her head,
tossing it across the room. Her breasts bounced in the sheer lacy
white bra she had on. She was reaching back to unclasp it when Daniel
stopped her. "Whoa! Slow down, please. Slow. Make it slow."

Cindy grinned, and let her arms fall to the side. She thrust her chest
out. Her nipples could be seen hard and tight underneath the white
lace. With only a short flared skirt on, she was baring a lot of
leg. Her long blonde hair were cascading down to her shoulders.

She pulled down a hidden zipper on the side of her skirt, and with a
tantalizing wiggle of her hips the piece of cloth slid down her legs
to pool at her feet. Her underwear matched her bra, the same sheer
white lace hinting at the hidden treasures underneath.  She ran her
hand over the material, shivering once more and sighing loudly.

She lifted her hand to her mouth, sliding two fingers into her mouth,
her eyes closed. When they were properly wet, she thrust them into her
panties and gasped as she clearly ran them through her slit. Daniel
watched on mesmerized as Cindy started to pleasure herself with lazy
broad strokes, her breathing punctuated by sighs.

She opened her eyes, smiled at him. "Sorry about that," she said with
a small voice. "I got carried away a little bit. I was imagining it
was your tongue down there, exploring me..." She shook her
head. "Where was I? Ah yes... 'Strip,' you said. 'Make it slow,' you
said."

Reaching behind her, she unclasped her bra, but she kept it up with
one hand, preventing it from uncovering her breasts. "By the way,
you'll have to tell me what you'd like me to wear from now on. Like
for lingerie--do you prefer it virginal white? Wicked red? Deep
black?" She teased him by slowly dropping the bra. "Or do you prefer
none at all--au naturel, if you will?" Her breasts came into view as
the bra fell down to the ground. Her nipples were hard. She pinched
one with a hand as she cupped her breasts, hefting them up. "Oh, look
at that," she said, her voice soft. "My titties like you, Dan. They
know they're yours, that you can do what you want with them: kiss
them, suck them, bite them... whatever you want."

She let her hands travel down her sides to her panties, which she
hooked beneath her fingers before sliding down her shapely legs. She
tossed the thin white material in Daniel's direction. She ran her
fingers through the trimmed patch of blonde fur above her lips,
accompanying the motion with a short moan. "You'll also have to tell
me if you prefer me to be shaved bald--like a little girl."

Daniel did not respond, merely stared at the beautiful blonde girl
baring herself before him. He was turned on, there was no doubt about
it, and he was enjoying himself. It took a bit of an effort to push to
the side the emotions of the past few days, but his body--his
cock--seemed to have a mind of its own, and he did not feel like
fighting it.

Meanwhile, Cindy had her two hands in her crotch, pulling her pussy
lips apart with her fingers while gently running two of them up and
down her slicked slit, moaning throughout. She lifted those two
fingers to her face. "Fuck, I'm so wet..." she said before putting
those two fingers in her mouth and sucking loudly.

She pushed those same two fingers in her pussy, collapsing on her
knees as she did so. She fingerfucked herself right before him, her
eyes closing. "So tight... I'm tight just for you, Dan. Oh! My tight
cunt is all yours, Dan, to fuck whenever you want, however you want."
She closed her eyes, overwhelmed by the sensations. Saying those words
out loud seemed to turn her on even more.

She straightened up, her hand still pushing in and out between her
thighs, her eyes fastened on his crotch. "Are you gonna come here and
feed me your cock, Dan? Push it in deep, choke me up? You can come
here and fuck my mouth as hard as you want, whenever you want... It's
all yours. I'm all yours."

She was springing up and down on her knees, her hand working hard on
her pussy, fingers sliding in and out, the sound of suction loud in
the silent living room. Daniel looked at her, her mouth wide open, her
eyes half closed, her breasts bouncing, her legs taut with the effort
to keep themselves spread out and her pelvis thrust up.

Daniel moved closer to her, and raised a hand to palm her cheek. She
exhaled loudly before turning her head and capturing his thumb between
her lips, sucking it inside her mouth, swirling her tongue around it
as she bobbed her head back and forth over it. Through it all, she
kept her eyes riveted on his crotch.

Grunting, Daniel pulled Cindy upwards, and she stumbled to her
feet. Her hand, which had previously been busy thrusting fingers up
her pussy shot straight up into his mouth, and she painted his lips
with her wet fingers before following up with a scorching kiss. Her
stomach pressed against his erection, and her not-so subtle movements
did not help his composure.

"Cin," he said, pulling out of the kiss, leaving the blonde girl
panting, "if we're gonna do this, then none of that master and slave
crap, okay?"

"Are you telling me it's not turning you on even a little bit? To have
a blonde cutie at your beck and call, ready to fulfill your most
sickening desires?" Her lips were in his neck, her hands underneath
his shirt, and it did feel amazing.

Daniel grunted again. "Well... Considering..." Cindy had grasped his
cock through his pants, and was rubbing her hand hard against
it. "Considering all that's happened around here, that may not be in
the best of taste..."

"Oh, come on!" teased Cindy, running her lips on the side of his
jaw. "Yes, what happened was bad and evil and condemnable. But this is
different... This is fun"

She took his hand and brought it down to her pussy, which he found
soaked. "See," she said, "I'm so wet I'm dripping. This is what I
want, Dan, for you to use me. That's what gets me hot. Maybe I'm
fucked up, but hurray for you--you get to reap the benefits of my
craziness." She thrust her hips forward, pressing into his hand. "Put
your fingers in... Oh! Like that!"

Daniel's fingers sank in with no resistance whatsoever. Cindy was not
lying--she was aroused. Still, what he told her was also the
truth. After what he had witnessed at the frat house, the last thing
he wanted was domination. It reminded him too much of Biff, of Jenn,
of the rest of the girls. Even though Cindy wanted it. Did he truly
believe she did, or was she just programmed to believe she did? Where
did it end, the doubt, the questioning?

"You said I'm charge, right?" he asked her, as she writhed before him,
pumping herself up and down on his fingers. She nodded, lost in a
haze. "Then what I want is for you to do your very best to pleasure
yourself with me. That's what makes me hot. To see you lose control
and want me. Would that work?"

She grinned, still rubbing herself up and down on his fingers. "It
might. Doing what you want makes me hot, and if what you want is for
me to ravish you, then I think I can sacrifice myself. But you should
know--I can be very kinky." She pulled his fingers out of her snatch
and raised them up to her lips before sucking on them, her eyes never
leaving his. "Downright perverted, in fact."

"I'm sure I can deal."

"Good, because I believe I owe you a nasty blow job right about now."
She waved the folded note between two fingers, before chuckling and
dropping to her knees. "I've been craving this big boy in my mouth for
the past hour," she said, unfastening his belt and pulling his pants
down.

Cindy wasted no time to engulf his already hard cock between her lips
and suck it enthusiastically, her head bobbing, her long blonde hair
thrown to and fro. She hummed as she worked, the vibrations sending
delicious sensations up Daniel's spine. When she pushed her head down
until his cock hit the back of her throat and held it there, swirling
her tongue on the underside of his shaft, Daniel's knees buckled. When
she did it again, and then one more time, Daniel shivered so hard he
lost his balance, and fell down onto the carpet.

Cindy never let him go, following him down the whole way, and once
they were both on the ground continued her blow job as if there had
been no interruption. She even seemed to double in fervor, pushing her
head onto his cock more violently than before, to the extent that
Daniel had to grab hold of her head to keep from being injured.

"Fuck! That's right," she groaned, jacking him off with a hand, a line
of drool dripping from her lips. "Grab my head and fuck my face, Dan!"
She thrust her head back down and resumed her blow job, open-mouthed
this time, hard jab after hard jab.

It was too much for Daniel--it was edging the fine line between
pleasurable and painful, and he tried to snake away, but Cindy was
latched on to him like a leech. He finally grabbed her hair and pulled
her off of him.

She knelt beside him, panting, her lips red, grinning widely. "If
you're not gonna fuck my face, then how about you fuck my cunt, huh?"
She flipped onto her hands and knees and pressed her head against the
carpet, raising her ass high.

Daniel stared. Her ass was round, rounder than Jenn's, her skin
lighter, but still a wonder to behold. Between her parted thighs, he
could spy her slit, dewy and practically pulsing. When two of her
fingers snuck down and parted her pussy lips, they separated with a
wet sound that was echoed by that of her fingers dipping into her
hole. She rocked her hips back and forth, thrusting her ass up on
every outward push, all the while fucking herself rapidly. Her juices
were coating her fingers like oil seeping from a jar.

"Please," she pleaded, her voice perfectly pitched, "please fuck me! I
want to feel you deep inside me! Come on! You know how good it feels
inside, how hot it is, how tight... Just put your cock in there and
shove! Just fuck--Oh! OH!"

Kneeling behind the bent-over form of the blonde girl, Daniel fucked
her hard, relishing the way her pussy clasped his shaft in its grip,
the way her buttocks shook with every one of his thrusts, the way she
let out a gasp every time he bottomed out.

After the superb job she had done with her mouth, he knew he would not
be able to hold on for very long, and in an attempt to maximize her
pleasure, getting an understanding of what she might like, he grasped
her hair in his fist and pulled--not hard, just enough to get her
attention. And it did. She groaned, "Fuck yes! Fuck me! Harder!"
before pulling herself up on her hands and arching herself backwards.

Fuck her harder he did. To the music of her cries, he pounced, still
holding on to her hair, keeping her head up, his skin slapping on her
skin. She moaned her joy when he reached underneath her and grabbed
one of her swinging breasts, grasping her nipple and twisting it
lightly.

Cindy was tensing up, he could feel it, her moans having both grown in
intensity and in frequency. If he timed it right, they could come
together. As he thrust into her, relishing the sensation of her ass
pressing against his hips, the medallion thumping on his chest gave
him an idea.

"Come here," he said, growling out the words in an attempt to sound
rougher than he was, and jerking on her hair. She arched her back
more, and when he did not let up, she straightened up, going up on her
knees to press her shoulders against his chest, her back still arched
to keep his cock inside her. Daniel let go of her hair and grasped her
breasts and squeezed them, to her groaning delight.

"When I pinch your clit," he growled in her ear, "I want you to come
hard." Cindy did not reply, merely moaned in what he took to be an
agreement, and he wasted no time in trailing his hand down her taut
stomach to her slit, stretched tight by his own cock embedded deep
inside. There was no angle to thrust, and so Cindy was twisting her
hips, gyrating them to provide a different but still wonderful
sensation. And then he located her clitoris, hard and angry and
begging to be touched, and he grasped it between his fingers and
squeezed.

She exploded. As he had hoped. The medallion worked, or her mind was
so primed that it did not matter whether it worked or not. He had told
her to come, and she did. Hard. A long hard shuddering orgasm that
made her cry out, a cry that reshaped itself into a scream as Daniel
whispered in her ear, "Come!"

She bucked violently, her shivers threatening to tease them apart, and
he had to pull her back against him hard to keep her standing, and she
moaned deep in her throat as she thrust her ass back towards him, her
pussy clenching madly around his cock. He could not resist and
whispered "Come!" in her ear again.

She stiffened as if hit by an electric shock, and as she shouted "Oh
fuck!" her hands shot backwards to latch onto his buttocks and pull
him roughly deeper into her as she rapidly shoved her ass back at him,
whimpering incoherently, her pussy a frenzy of quivers and shudders
and pulses that milked him like the hand of a farmer's daughter. When
he whispered "Come!" in her ear again, the shock that ran through her
crushed his cock in a viselike grip and just like that, with nary a
thrust, he came, to Cindy's delirious glee, as she laughed and cried
and pressed herself against him while the final crashing waves of her
multiple orgasms echoed across her body.

They folded to the ground, still united, and they remained there,
silent, catching their respective breaths. Daniel summoned the energy
to reach over and grab the blanket from the bed. They were both
covered in sweat, and Cindy was shivering.

"Wow," exhaled Cindy, once she had regained the capacity to form
words. "That was..."

"Yeah..."

"Promise me you're gonna fuck me like that often?"

"As long as my dick doesn't fall off."

"Don't worry," she turned her head around and sought his mouth. "I'm
gonna be a doctor. I'll figure out a way to glue it back on."

They kissed.

"I'm gonna make a hard-ass master out of you yet," she whispered, a
twinkle in her eyes. Daniel swatted her ass in lieu of a response.


				* * *


Several hours later, with a thoroughly exhausted Cindy fast asleep in
the bedroom, Daniel sat alone on the sofa, a triple glass of scotch
from the hotel bar downstairs in hand, Cindy's computer next to
him. He had been sitting there, motionless but for the intermittent
sips from his glass, for the past hour, once again contemplating how
his life had changed, and also gathering courage. The laptop was off,
the thumb drive sitting atop the folded cover. It beckoned him, while
at the same time frightening him.

Emails, Cindy had said. Emails from Jenn, from Biff, emails with
pictures and videos attached, that had never been delivered--had never
left the server. Daniel remembered how Biff had raged that Daniel had
ignored him, ignored what he had sent. But he had never received
it. Cindy's best guess was that someone had quarantined every message
from Biff and from Jenn, writing from Biff's account, with Daniel's
email as a destination. That fit with a story that Jackson had told
her a while back.

And so Daniel had more than two months' worth of emails that he could
go through if he wanted. He did not want to, although he knew full
well he would in the future. But not now. Besides, he had a pretty
clear idea what was in those emails, and in those pictures, and in
those videos. Biff had said as much: pictures of Jenn, videos of Jenn,
being controlled into... well, into a sexual slave for the prurient
pleasures of the bastard--the now burned-to-a-crisp bastard--who had
brainwashed her into it.

Daniel worried about what Biff had done to her. Biff had said that he
had programmed Jenn with specific instructions in case she was away
from him for too long. How long? And what would happen now that Biff
was dead? What would happen to her? He felt the drive to move, to jump
off the couch and head outside and search for her. But where to start?
O'Neill had started the search, said he was on top of things, he had
people that could be much more productive that Daniel could. Which did
not help Daniel's feelings of helplessness.

He stared at the thumb drive. There were a few emails that Cindy had
said he should look at, emails written by Jenn. Cindy had looked
contrite as she said that, and Daniel had a pretty good idea, once
again, what those emails entailed. And then there was the story. She
had not provided more details.

It took him ten minutes to work up the courage to pick up the
laptop. He powered it up, plugged in the thumb drive. Folders with
emails, with videos. He ignored them all. There was a file among the
folders. Charlie and the Chancellor's Plot. He clicked on it. It was a
printed version of a story that claimed to have been published online,
a week earlier. Cindy had marked up the text with a yellow box: In
Flights of Erotic Fantasy Magazine, May 2012, pp. 15-37.

Daniel started reading.

Charlie and the Chancellor's Plot, by J. Dumas.

It was year four hundred and sixteen of the Renascence Era, a full
forty one years since the Great Darkness War, and thirty five years
into the reign of King Altobar the First, Wise Ruler and Hero of the
War. The land had been at peace for much of that time, the King having
dispatched the last persisting remnants of Darkness from the realm
with an alacrity that had bordered on earnestness. But rumors of a new
peril had started to seep the kingdom, a peril more pernicious than
invading armies of soulless undead.

Daniel frowned. A story? Cindy had marked up the side of the first
page: J. Dumas = Jennifer? Jenn used to call Daniel, Radhu, and Serena
the three musketeers, and she jokingly referred to herself as
D'Artagnan in that context. That had been during her Alexandre Dumas
phase, when she had plowed through all the three volumes of the
Musketeers series--as well as The Count of Monte-Cristo and the lesser
known The Black Tulip--that last one in the original French--in a
frenzied reading orgy their first summer together.

He read through the story, a piece of very explicit erotica--really,
porn--set in a Tolkienesque fantasy world featuring a group of royal
guards in some unspecified kingdom, wherein one of the guards--a woman
nicknamed Charlie--is slipped a love potion by a rival for her
affections, and in which her lover Oliver and her friends try to help
her. The plot revolved around the attempt to take over the throne.

Daniel read. He recognized Jenn's writing style, the voice she favored
in most of her creative writing. Cindy had marked up the text on
several pages: Charlie = Jenn, Oliver = Dan. The antagonist, the Count
of Rochefort, like in the first Musketeers volume, was circled by
Cindy. Rochefort = Biff? Later, more annotations. The Count of
Rochefort, in the story, was a knight in the Dragoons of the Imperial
Kingdom, the Chancellor's personal guard. Dragoons of the Imperial
Kingdom = DIK = Delta Iota Kappa? Chancellor = Kevin? He shivered. It
fit. Even the character names: Charlie, Oliver.

He fired up a web browser. He had read The Three Musketeers when he
was young, and remembered the main story line, but the details were
fuzzy. But Jenn had talked about it for a full summer, commenting on
Dumas's writing style and choices of locales and characters, and had
talked about the inspiration for those characters. A quick web search
confirmed what he had dimly remembered. In the stories, the
characters' full names were Charles de Batz-Castelmore d'Artagnan,
which gave him Charlie. And Jenn had referred to herself as
D'Artagnan. And there was Olivier d'Athos de la Fère. Oliver. And Jenn
had called Daniel Athos that summer. It fit. Oliver the lover, with
his friends Portia and Aramia, trying to free Charlie who's under the
clutches of a love potion stolen by Rochefort--Biff. And the scene at
the pub, where Rochefort forces Charlie to offer herself to Oliver in
a travesty of seduction? Those were the events at the diner where
Daniel had first seen Jenn once she was back from her trip with
Biff. It fit.

Cindy had marked up the end of the story: Programming loophole?
Fiction okay? Daniel stared, seeing the words that confirmed what he
himself was thinking already. Jenn was giving her side of the story,
and she had managed to do so by couching it as a piece of
fiction. Biff would not have let her tell the truth of what was
happening to her--that much had been obvious--but somehow his
programmed left her with the ability to craft fiction that she could
use to convey messages.

He stared at the story, scrolled to the last paragraph.

You haven't lost me, she thought, I'm still here, I'm still me. I
still love you. Find me, Oliver. Find me, and we shall be together
again.

He closed the laptop, plunging the room into darkness. "I will,
love. I promise."