Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

 

Something was wrong.  Irin was in the middle of the Weave she’d jumped, and it didn’t feel right, almost like when you try to slip a shoe onto the wrong foot.  That thought scared her because once inside the web, she was all but defenseless.  In the next second her mind was wiped clear of all thought other than pain as her back slammed into a hard surface, fully knocking the wind out of her for the second time that day. 

 

At first it was all she could do to draw ragged breath after ragged breath through her lungs.  When she finally did open her eyes, she snapped them shut again against the harsh light blazing down on her.  She raised a hand to shield them and blinked a few times to try and get rid of the spots she was seeing.  Only then did her ears start to pick up the sounds floating around her.  It almost sounded like someone was calling her name, but how was that possible?  Other words lazily filtered through her ears, and it took a little while for her brain to comprehend their meaning. 

 

“Agent Irin, can you hear me?”  Of course I can hear you! she thought.  “Are you alright?” That question gave her pause.  Was she alright?  She started doing a mental inventory of her body, seeing if anything didn’t seem right.  She had just gotten to her legs when a new voice came through.

 

“Open this f*****g door!  I need to get in there!”  It sounded far away, but she knew that voice.  There was a faint rumbling and then, as if he were right next to her, “Irin!” 

 

“Lance?” she murmured, lifting her head up and squinting in the direction from which the voice had come. 

 

“Oh, thank goodness!” he exclaimed as he rushed over and knelt by her side, scooping her into his arms.  “Are you alright?”  The worry was palpable in his voice. 

 

“I’m fine,” she replied, pushing lightly on his shoulders until she was far enough away to see his face.  “Why do people keep asking me that?”

 

“You were missing.  You Wove off in the middle of a mission, and we had no idea where you’d gone…” 

 

Irin stopped listening as she took in her surroundings: smack dab in the middle of the platform of the Weave Bay.  Her brows drew together in confusion as she tried to put two and two together, and suddenly it hit her.  “Oh!” she exclaimed. 

 

“What is it?  What’s wrong?” Lance asked worriedly. 

 

“Something must have gone wrong with the Weave,” she murmured, but he continued looking at her in alarm.

 

“What are you talking about?”

 

“I wasn’t supposed to end up here,” she replied easily, as if it were obvious.

 

“What?  Of course you were supposed to end up here.  This is the Weave Bay, where you Weave in,” he explained slowly as if he were talking to a small child. 

 

“I know where I am, Lance.  Thank you for that,” she bit back sarcastically, and some of the worry left his face.  There couldn’t be anything too terribly wrong with her if she was being her sarcastic self. 

 

“Then what do you mean?”

 

She shook her head and sat back on her heels, finally detaching herself from Lance’s hold.  “I mean I wasn’t trying to Weave here.  I was supposed to end up somewhere else,” she clarified, looking him in the eye. 

 

 “Where else?” 

 

“I don’t know,” she said hesitantly. 

 

Lance opened his mouth to question her further, but three people burst through the door, cutting him off. 

 

“Sir, we need you to step back,” one said, coming up behind Lance and placing a hand on his shoulder. 

 

Another knelt next to Irin and asked, “Ma’am, how are you feeling?” 

 

Irin looked back and forth between the two newcomers in bewilderment.  “I’m fine.  What’s going on?” she asked, but then she spotted the third figure near the entryway.  “Commander!” she cried. 

 

“Let the medical techs look at you, Irin.  They’re going to make sure you’re alright,” he told her calmly.

 

“But sir, I’m fine!”  

 

“It wasn’t a request.”  His words were like steel. 

 

“Let them do their jobs,” Lance stood up, “It’s protocol after a Code Three.  You know that.”

 

“You called a Code Three?” she questioned in alarm.  “Why did you do that?”  She wanted to stand up to talk to him, but one of the medical techs had his fingers to her neck to check her pulse. 

 

“Are you feeling any dizziness or light sensitivity?” the tech asked her, holding a scanner in front of her chest.  She responded in the negative, and when he sat back, she took it upon herself to scramble up before they could stop her.

 

“Are you daft?” Lance replied incredulously, “Why do you think we called a Code Three?  You disappeared in the middle of a mission.”  He glared at her. 

 

“Well, yeah, but didn’t you find my Weave signature?    You should have just followed me if you were so worried,” she told him, placing a hand on her hip.

 

“Oh, we found your Weave signature alright, right next to this huge energy burst that screwed our instruments to kingdom come.  We could barely follow your trail down the street, let alone tell where you’d Woven to!” he snapped in frustration. 

 

Irin had the good grace to look sheepish at that revelation.  “I �"” she began, but she was interrupted by the Commander clearing his throat. 

 

“I suggest you continue this little reunion in the War Room,” he advised her sternly.  “I will be joining you shortly. 

 

“Yes, sir,” she responded, her sheepish look morphing into one of guilt.  She quickly turned around and exited the Bay, Lance hot on her heels.  Neither of them spoke as they pushed through the glass doors of the empty room across the floor.  Irin sighed and rubbed her temples as it slowly sank in how much of a cluster f**k this was turning out to be.  She could feel Lance’s glare, and eventually she couldn’t take it anymore.  “Aren’t you going to say anything?”

 

Lance stood next to the table and had his arms crossed as he scowled at her.  He waited a few seconds before responding.  “I’m waiting for you to give me what you think your good excuse is for this whole fiasco,” he said coldly. 

 

Irin looked down at her hands.  “You know I didn’t mean for all this to happen.”

 

“I’m sure you didn’t,” he bit back, “but that doesn’t really change anything, now does it?” 

 

That pricked her ire.  “Hey, I’m sorry about this.  You know that, and there’s not a whole lot I can do about it now, so your attitude is not helping anybody,” she replied defensively. 

 

He stared coldly at for a bit longer before he sighed and his shoulders relaxed.  “Alright fine, it’s just been a really long night.  Could you please tell me what happened?” he asked far less aggressively this time.

 

“Are you actually going to believe me this time?” she retorted bitterly, but his expression clearly told her not to push it.  Rolling her eyes, she pulled out a chair from the table and sat down heavily.  “Remember how I told Jace about that Weaver in Ireland?”  Lance nodded.  “Well, he was there in Saudi.  I don’t know how he managed to find us, but he did.  He was watching from a building along that alley in the back when I went out to cuff my hostile, and he bolted when he saw I’d spotted him.” 

 

“You thought it would be a good idea just to take off after him without telling either of us what was going on?” Lance questioned her, taking a seat on the bed thing behind him.

 

“I wasn’t exactly thinking about you and Jace at that moment.  I was more concerned with catching him before he got away.  Well, that and the elation of knowing I definitely wasn’t crazy.  You can only tell yourself so many times that you definitely saw something while having no one believe you before you start to get a little concerned, but there he was again!”  She paused, realizing she’d begun rambling, and cleared her throat.  “Anyway, I wasn’t about to let him get away again.  First off, he’s a rogue Weaver popping in on missions, and second, you guys would have locked me away if I came back with another story of seeing him.” 

 

Lance groaned and put his head in his hands.  “So you’re telling me it’s our fault you decided to put yourself in a potentially very dangerous position?” 

 

“Clearly you’re not listening very well.  I did say that he was a rogue Weaver popping in on missions, and that pretty much warranted me following him.  But yeah, I was thinking about how you didn’t believe me before, and I didn’t want that to happen again.  Chill out, I would have chased him regardless.” 

 

He just shook his head in amazement at her logic.  “I can’t believe you thought that was a good idea.”

 

“Well, what would you have done?” she exclaimed hotly.  “I’d already seen his abilities to escape firsthand in Ireland.  What, do you think I should have waited around for you guys to decide if I were losing it or not?”

 

“That would have been a lot saner than what you did!” 

 

“Well, I don’t agree with you, and I wanted answers so I chased him down the street and then jumped his Weave,” she explained matter-of-factly. 

 

His eyes bugged in amazement.  “You jumped that?” he cried. 

 

She didn’t understand his astonishment.  “Yeah, it wasn’t that hard.  I mean, he Wove faster than anyone I’ve ever seen before, but I only had to make a latching web.  I managed to get it done once I realized he was Weaving.”

 

Lance had a lot of questions about that Weave stemming from what he and Jace had seen on the scanner, but he decided to hold those for later.  “So then what happened?” 

 

“We ended up in a cellar or something.  I have no idea where or when, but I was a bit more concerned with trying to keep him from running away again.  There was no way I would be able to keep up at that point,” she continued.

 

“Why, what happened?” 

 

“Well, just because I was able to jump his Weave doesn’t mean it was my cleanest work.  I rolled into a wooden barrel upon landing and had the wind knocked out of me.” 

 

He smirked at this revelation.  “I see.”

 

“Oh, stuff it.”  She was about to say more when she heard yelling from outside the War Room.  “I’m going to take a wild guess and say that’s Jace,” Irin said in resignation, glancing through the glass wall for confirmation.

 

The door burst open to reveal her frantic looking brother.  His eyes roved the room quickly until they spotted Irin.  “Ah, hell,” he muttered, rushin over to envelope her in a tight hug.  “I was so worried about you,” he whispered through her hair. 

 

She tightened her arms around his torso as she felt a new wave of guilt wash through her.  “I know, I’m so sorry,” she whispered back. 

 

He gave her a quick squeeze before stepping back to get a good look at her.  “How are you?” he asked. “And don’t you dare lie to me.” 

 

She rolled her eyes.  “I’m fine, I promise,” she repeated for what felt like the thousandth time that day. 

 

Jace looked to Lance who shrugged.  “The med techs cleared her, so she’s good to go.”

 

The words were bare out of his mouth when the door opened once more, admitting the Commander.  “Sit,” he ordered them in a steely voice.  They hastened to obey as he sat in a chair on the opposite side of the table and began to organize a few files in front of him.  When he finally did look up, he pierced them each with his stern gaze, never once breaking eye contact.  Irin was torn between defiantly staring back and squirming, but Jace was firmly within the realm of looking remorseful.  Lance just sat their patiently. 

 

The Commander finally returned his gaze to Jace and said, “So.”  None of them said anything, deciding it was far more prudent to wait for him to finish whatever he had to say.  “Well, aren’t you going to start feeding me excuses for why this all happened?  I’d really like to hear why a Code Three was called on an agent who claimed to have seen a rogue Weaver on a previous mission, but that incident was never reported.  I’d also like to know where the hell she went when she decided to Weave away from a mission.  What do you three have to say for yourselves?” he fairly growled at them.  There was another moment of silence before he looked at Irin.  “Let’s start with you.  Your brothers already had the opportunity to give me a brief rundown of what happened in Ireland.  Tell me your side.”

 

Irin cleared her throat, wondering what exactly the twins had said about Ireland.  Then she launched into the full story, starting with returning to cuff her first opponent, going through the chase in the woods and culminating with the stranger Weaving away in a huge burst of light unlike anything she’d ever seen. 

 

The Commander let her story sink in.  “I see,” was his curt response as he turned back to Jace.  “And why didn’t you bother to even check out her story with your fancy scanner?” 

 

Jace glanced at Irin.  “The trail was cold by the time I had returned.  If I’d had more specialized equipment, it might have been possible, but from the way she explained it, it had been over ten minutes.  For any normal Weaver, the trail would have dissipated by that point,” he explained.

 

“But it wasn’t a normal Weaver,” the Commander retorted bluntly.

 

“I had no way of knowing that at the time, seeing as it wasn’t even plausible that there was a rogue Weaver present.  It was so out of the realm of possibilities that I didn’t see a point in looking for a trail I wasn’t even sure ever existed, let alone one I thought had already dissipated.” 

 

“And where were you when all this was happening?” the Commander asked Lance.

 

“I had chased my opponent a ways into the Irish forest by the time I got him, so Jace gave me the go ahead to just bring him in from where I was rather than return to them.  Jace showed up here with one of his opponents not long after I did, and we both turned them over.  I started filling out the paperwork while Jace went to head back to Ireland,” Lance told them. 

 

“So then you two brought back the other hostiles and proceeded to make sure none of her little misadventure made it into the final report.  Is that right?”  They all looked sheepish at that but nodded.  “Alright, Irin, tell me about Saudi Arabia and what happened after.”

 

This was the part Irin was simultaneously dreading and hoping for.  On the one hand, she had been vindicated.  Her rogue Weaver definitely existed, and they believed her now.  On the other hand, she was worried the entire situation was going to be blown way out of proportion.  The rogue Weaver was going to be treated like the worst sort of security risk, and while she didn’t know him very well, he’d always run from her rather than attack her, so he didn’t feel all that threatening to her.  At that moment, though, she didn’t have any choice but to tell them what had happened, so she did.  She started with heading back into the alley, chasing him through the street and then managing to jump his Weave.

 

“You jumped his Weave?” the Commander clarified. 

 

“Yes,” she explained not for the first time that day.  She was beginning to get the feeling that her brothers and the Commander knew something about this Weaver that she didn’t.  Shaking her head, she continued, explaining how they ended up in a cellar somewhere.  “He was about to run again, but when I called out to him, he stopped.  I tried to talk to him, but he didn’t understand English.  He didn’t seem to recognize Spanish or French either.  That pretty much left me with universal sign language.”

 

“And did you learn anything?” the Commander asked skeptically. 

 

“No, not really.  He just kept looking at me like I was amusing or something.  I was trying to get him to come back here with me so Lance could try talking to him and we could learn more from him, but a lot of noise came from upstairs, which spooked him.  He Wove off, and I jumped it again, but for some reason I ended up here instead of wherever he was going,” she told them, and faint confusion and hurt colored her tone.  She’d never had a problem with her webs before, and she couldn’t figure out why she hadn’t been able to follow him. 

 

Again, the Commander was silent as he digested her story.  “I take it you’re alright,” he said, his eyes softening a little as he looked at her. 

 

“I’m fine, I promise,” she assured him, but he still looked to her brothers for confirmation.  Why didn’t anyone believe her?

 

“She’s good to go,” Lance confirmed. 

 

The Commander nodded.  “Good.  I wouldn’t want you remanded to your bed for what I’m about to dole out,” he told them sternly, and they all blanched.  “The way I see it, you all committed vast breaches of protocol, which have led to a very dangerous situation.  The fact that nothing was reported from the Ireland trip is bad enough, but it didn’t end there.  Now we have a potentially dangerous Weaver on the loose who’s been popping in on our missions.  I can’t even begin to fathom how much of a security risk that could be, or what he is gaining by doing so. 

 

“Now, while the actual enactment was far from ideal, Irin had the right idea in trying to get the suspect to come in.  I can’t condone you disappearing in the middle of a mission without notifying your team, but you had the right idea.  Jace and Lance also were right to call the Code Three because they didn’t know what you were doing.  However, all of that might have been avoided had you all properly filled out your report and given your superiors the opportunity to decide if the story were worth investigating.  You each took it upon yourself to handle a situation that could potentially affect the entire Company, and for that I cannot let you off. 

 

“You will each receive a letter of censure in your files, and I am placing you on mandatory probation for a period not less than two weeks.  You will be on desk duty for that entire time, and you are banned from all social activities, including your volunteer work.”  Irin opened her mouth to protest, but he spoke over her.  “I don’t want to hear it.  Everyone around here managed to get along before you three started helping out, so they will be fine for the next two weeks.”  She shut her mouth and stared at him with something akin to abject horror.  She’d barely survived the two days her brothers had mandated, and now she had fourteen more to look forward to?  “I should think next time you will think twice before committing such egregious breaks from protocol.”

 

“Yes, sir,” they all intoned. 

 

“Good,” the Commander said.  “You’re dismissed.  Return tomorrow afternoon for your desk assignments, and I expect to see your complete mission report on my desk by the following afternoon.  Irin, I suspect Scotty will want to talk to you about the suspect’s Weaving soon.  Give him as much time as he needs,” he ordered, looking her in the eye.

 

She nodded in acknowledgment and followed her brothers out the door.  In a walk of shame, the three made their way across the floor.  There was a wait that felt like eternity with people whispering behind their backs before the elevator finally showed up and ferried them to the third floor.  They didn’t look at each other as they walked down the hallway until they got to 312.  Irin glanced up at each of her brothers with such a forlorn attempt at a brave face that it broke their hearts.  Then she made her way to 327 and shut her door with a resounding click.

 

© 2012 Padfoot101