Author's Notes: Sorry it took so long for me to post a new chapter. I was down in Australia on a long trip and I wasn't able to do too much work on this story. However, I am back now and am able to continue Sean's saga. This is a work in progress, so minor edits may still take place in preceding chapters as I go through the story. It won't be anything major, maybe a word or two here and there that were not quite right, or a typo that needed fixing. Enjoy this next installment! – Professor Obihiro

Guilty until proven innocent. – anonymous

Redemption

Chapter 2

Sean…

Sean…

I saw my parents in front of me, my father holding a cricket bat, my mother standing over his shoulder, smiling at me. I looked up at my dad. "Dad, when are we going to be able to go play cricket?" He grinned. "We'll go now." "All right!" I squealed.

Gray mists swirled round them as they disappeared into phantoms, hidden from me, and I felt an ache in my chest as they lost their physical forms…

Sean…

SEAN!

"SEAN OBIHIRO!"

I blinked and sat up, a metallic, fuzzy taste in my mouth. I was lying on the floor of the Command Center in Wily's WWW Castle. On the massive screen in front of me, Bass's pixilated features were screwed up in irritation. "Finally…you have awoken," he said through the sound system. "I thought that I would have to turn on the fire extinguisher system to free you from slumber." "Very funny," I grumbled. I was never very happy in the mornings, mainly because I felt absolutely horrible when I woke up.

"What news do you have for me this morning, Bass?" I growled, wiping the sand from the corners of my eyes.

"Well," he replied, drawing the word out, "I have a bank surveillance video here from the bank which was robbed, supposedly by you. Do you want to play it?"

"Yes," I replied, and he disappeared. The screen turned black, then went to the video.

I saw the interior of a local Bank of America on the grainy footage. The counter was in view, along with all of the clients that came into the building. I watched as the tellers packaged up money and passed it out to the depositors in small wads. A normal workday for them.

Then all of a sudden something changed. A man in a black trench coat walked into the frame and I felt a sudden chill down my spine. "Bass, pause that video." He did. "Now zoom in on that man's face and enhance." The picture slid to the one face in the crowd, then blurred for a second as the software worked, then cleared again.

I couldn't breathe.

I couldn't speak.

It was me. Not just sort of looking like me, stunt-double type of thing. It was the same face. It was the same clothes, same hairstyle, same everything as I had been wearing that day.

But it was not me.

I knew where I had been that day, and that was not me.

(S)(S)(S)

I sat at my kitchen table, nursing a mug of coffee. It was the perfect cup – thick, black, and strong enough to curl my hair. I was horribly tired after an all-night programming session and needed something caffeinated to give me the boost to get on with life. I knew that staying up all night staring at a computer screen and starting the day with coffee wasn't the most healthy of choices, but it was only once in a while that I did it, and I earned plenty of money off the rush-job programming that I did. I pulled on a pair of jeans and a white turtleneck, sculled the rest of my drink in one gulp, grabbed my trench coat and walked out the door of my studio apartment.

The air was crisp and clean as I walked down the street. I lived on Long Island, New York, and it was just coming into autumn. The leaves of the trees in my apartment complex were spinning down the paths as I walked, and the clouds above me scudded before the wind like the yachts that filled the sea surrounding my home. I live for days like this, I thought as I unlocked my car.

I rolled down the street, listening to the morning show on the local soft rock station. The DJ's were up to their usual inane antics, tormenting the interns at the studio and occasionally playing a song. I let it go in the background as I sorted out what I had to do today. I listened with half an ear to the news – the same old stories with different names. A suicide bombing in what was left of Israel, the usual stock market ups and downs, some robber in Germany who got stuck in a window, a bank robbery in New York City…what was the world coming to?

I rolled into the local net café at about ten o'clock in the morning, having bought myself a danish and another cup of coffee at the coffee shop on the corner of my street. Walking into the building, I automatically surveyed the interior to see if anyone suspicious was in there. This was an unfortunate carryover from my days as the leader of Gospel – every time I went into a public place, I automatically surveyed it for escape routes or people that might take more than a passing interest in me, and I knew the makes and models of the cars outside, maybe even the tag numbers if it was a small enough place. In the small net café, there was nothing out of the ordinary. The regulars were all in their places, and I nodded a greeting to each of them as I passed by on my way to an open computer. There was Nadia, the punk – she had a new piercing today, and her hair had an extra pink streak in it. Not bad looking, despite all that, but definitely not my type. Then there was Richard, the retiree, checking the news. He was nursing a cup of tea that he had obviously brought from home. Behind him was Don, the skinny, bright-white geek who took part-time classes at a local college. He was munching a Twinkie, and the can of Red Bull sitting next to the keyboard at his station did not bode well for his overall well-being. The idea of Red Bull at this time in the morning made me feel ill. I found the computer that I always used and slumped into the chair, setting the danish and coffee alongside the keyboard.

I logged into the system with a couple of quick keystrokes and opened the web browser to check my emails. Okay, Viagra advertisements, get-rich-quick schemes, free software, a couple from my business associates – open those later, one from Lan, one from Mayl…hello! What's this? One of the emails was a 256-bit encrypted message, sender unknown.

I had given my personal encryption to only a few people. Wily and Regal at Scilab knew it. Lan and his dad knew it. A few of my old friends from the Gospel days knew it. Chaud knew it, and that was all. How many…eight people knew that encryption. If it was being used, that meant either sensitive information or an emergency. How many of those people had the expertise to spoof an email program to not know the sender? Probably five of those. I looked around. No one was watching, so I inserted the key and opened the email.

"Sean,

You are going to be picked up by the Officials on charges of internet fraud, robbery, and murder. Somehow (I will not say how) I know it wasn't you. I am tipping you off so you can leave. A young man of your background always has options to choose from; I'm not naïve enough to think that you don't have plans in place for this sort of situation. Use them. Get out and prove your innocence, or you won't have a chance. There are people in high places who want your head, attached or not. Leave as soon as you receive this email, for your sake.

A friend"

I leaned back in my chair, my eyes wide in disbelief, the pulse hammering in my ears. I couldn't see the computer in front of me. If this was true, my life was shattered. By degrees I returned to normal, breathing deeply to counteract my racing heart and impose some order on the fragments of my life. I had to think. Clear my head, clear my mind…what do I need? A park somewhere, where I can sit under a tree and take stock of my situation. If this is true, it may be too risky to go home, so I need to get some money. Step will have some for me. Some of my old Gospel associates can help with other things. A car…they'll have the description and tags from mine by now. I quickly logged off the system as I munched my danish. Food and sleep were what I needed. "Rest is a weapon", Ludlum said in his books, and that was certainly true for me. I needed a nap, but I didn't have time for one right now. What I did have to have time for was a change in my appearance. Hat, gloves, different coat, something to throw off any pursuers that might have my description…no! They don't know what I'm wearing yet. All I need to disguise is my face somehow. And my walk and build. That will work if I can do that, then I can walk back to my apartment and see what the situation is there. With this in mind, I walked up to Richard. "Richard, I need a favor from you," I said. He looked up at me with bleary eyes. "I may be able to help you – what is it, Sean?" I looked at him apologetically. "I need to borrow your hat. This may sound slightly ridiculous, but it's an emergency." He fished around in his bag for it, then handed the shapeless beret to me with a bemused look. "Here you go, and may it do you good. How will I get it back?" I sighed inwardly – I wasn't quite sure, but then I got a flash of inspiration. "Richard, you know where my apartment is, right? Someone will be there, they'll give it back to you if you ask for it."

I pulled the floppy beret over my eyes and shuffled out the door, changing my gait as much as I could. There – outside the door! Two men stood on the sidewalk across the road, waiting to cross on the crosswalk. One was standing on the right side of the door, dressed in coarse clothes and work boots, smoking a fag. A van with blacked-out windows sat across the road. All the men had hard, alert eyes. Soldiers' eyes, policemen's eyes, criminals' eyes – the eyes of those who were aware of their surroundings. They were looking for me. My mind began to race as I studied them from under the shapeless hat. They were here – that meant they knew my usual haunts. It was likely that all of them were staked out. I was certain that they were at my apartment. Can't go back home, I'll be picked up for sure. Sorry, Richard. No time to go to a park and think; that luxury means wasting precious minutes. Every second the noose draws tighter.What do I need if I'm going to get away? I mentally reviewed the list as I shambled down the sidewalk. I had nothing as far as clothes, but I could buy those wherever I wanted to. I was properly clothed. I had a palm-size computer in my pocket and a PET with a few programs on it. My lock picks were in my pocket. About all that I needed was money and wheels, and I knew where to go for those. With that in mind, I walked down the street for about two miles and caught a bus to Brooklyn.

I got off the bus at a stop in the seedy part of town. A few kids were playing a game of baseball in the street, and others were whacking tennis balls against a crumbling brick wall. I walked up to a ramshackle old warehouse signposted "Step's Garage" and yelled, "Hey Step, you gonna open up for an old friend?" As the echoes of my shout died away inside the building, the dingy steel door in front of me opened and Stepan Papadakis stepped out. His thick features immediately lit up as he saw me. "SEAN! Long time no see, old man!" He crushed me in an iron bear hug and led me inside.

As I went through the front room, I saw that not much had changed since I had been there last. Step was never known for his cleanliness, and the waiting area was strewn with filthy ashtrays and overflowing bins of trash. A lazy fly sat on the chair by his grime-encrusted window as he led me to his office. Closing the door, he sat behind a desk piled high with car magazines and greasy parts and said, "So, whut can I do fa you today, Sean? You want a ca chopped, you want sumfin you can't find anywhea else, you lookin fa someone, you need money?" His accent was thick enough to lean against, thickened by years of living in the hard side of town and roughened by the tobacco he poisoned himself with. He lit up a cigarette, and I struggled to hide how much I hated the smoke.

"Yeah, Step, I gotta get my money out from you. You got some of it buried in offshore accounts, doncha?" He nodded and tapped the glowing red ash from his cig. "Yeah, I did that like you wanned, but I still got forty thou' left here. All of it yours." He stepped over to the wall and spun the dial on the safe. I held up a hand and stopped him. "Wait." He looked at me, puzzled. I stepped over to him and said, "You keep money from all of your clients in this?" "Yeah," he growled defensively. "Guy down at the shop, he sed it wuz the best, y'know?" I motioned him away with one hand and stepped up to the safe. Turning my back, I spun the dial. Then I stepped up to the safe, put my ear to the door and turned the dial slowly, listening for the telltale clicks as the tumblers slipped into place. In two minutes I had cracked the safe and pulled out my money. I looked at Step and said, "My advice to you is: Get a better safe. By the way, do you have a cheap, anonymous car that I can buy off you? Extra points if it's fast." He nodded, shaken, and motioned me out the door. That was good. I wanted him nervous, for despite the fact that I called him "friend", he most certainly was not. If he thought he had a chance, he would rob me blind. Now that he knew what my capabilities were, he would be most careful not to make me an enemy.

We walked into the warehouse portion of the building, where men were busy disassembling and reassembling cars, filing off serial numbers, and loading pieces into trucks. Step led me around the back of the building to a car lot and gestured grandly at a small, nondescript four-door. "What is that?" I asked. He grinned, showing a mouthful of broken, tobacco-stained teeth. "That thea, Sean, is a Honda Civic, 2004 model, green, with 100,000 miles on it. What that doesn't tell you is that she has aw-wheel-drive an' a crate engine." I surveyed the car. Nondescript, small, dinged up a bit, good motor… "0-60? Quarter?" I asked. "She'll do a 5-second 0-60 and a 15-second quarter, and rip it through the slalom too." I grinned. If I needed the speed, I had it. "Tags? Registration?" He gave me a canny glance. "They'll hold up ta any cazuel 'spection. Do I look like I'm stupid or sumpin, old man?" Perfect, I thought, as I nodded curtly at him. "It'll do. What's the cost?" He looked at me cannily from under his vast bushy eyebrows. "Ten thou'," he finally answered. "You're robbing me," I retorted to him. "I'll pay six." "Seven," he countered. "She's in good shape, an' you're takin' edventage of my friendship." "Done," I replied, and passed him the bills.

Within five minutes I was rolling north with only the clothes on my back, a set of lock picks, and $33,000 dollars in a plastic bag underneath the passenger seat. I contemplated my next order of business. Change my appearance…they probably will have a description of what I am wearing by now. I need to buy some new clothes somewhere along the way, and I should dye my hair.

Maybe I should just explain something here. I was blessed (or cursed, depending on your point of view) with a very distinctive look. I'm tall (around six feet three inches) and slim, with a wiry physique – strength without bulk. My karate teacher told me I moved "like a panther", light on my feet. My hair, due to a genetic anomaly, is prematurely gray. Probably my most noticeable feature is my eyes, set deeply under my brows and colored a light reddish-brown. All of these things combine to make me incredibly hard to disguise.

I found a Wal-Mart at one of the exits along the highway and headed in after hiding my hair with the floppy beret. It was a bit of a gamble to even go into the place, but I was betting that the dragnet wouldn't have extended this far yet. In hindsight, it seems a miracle that I wasn't picked up. However, at the time, I wasn't worried. I walked through as if I owned the place, picked up some clothes and other necessaries, and walked out. Simple as that. Once I exited, I picked up some food from a McDonald's drive-through and hit the road again.

I had decided to go north, to Maine. The country up there was sparse enough that I reckoned I could escape attention for a day or two while I figured out what to do. Once I arrived there, I checked into a local ratbag motel and dyed my hair a whitish blond.

(S)(S)(S)

Two days later, I was on the WWW Island, battling the turmoil of my mind as I watched myself do things that I had never done. The fragmented images from the video imbedded themselves in my mind and tore at me like knives. I saw the man walk in – me, right down to the very clothes; I saw people silently screaming as they fell to the floor in terror; I saw the man quickly gathering bundles of money and shoveling them into a bag; I saw the guard reach for his weapon and the quick spurts of fire captured by the camera as he went down, his hand still spasmodically clutching for the weapon as his life drained into a pool around him; I saw the murderer, who was me and not me, as he ran out the back door into the alley. An avalanche of noise and pictures rushed over me as my mind tried to comprehend the magnitude of the images I saw. "That…is not…me…," I whispered as my brain whirled with madness.

Bass watched me quietly and impassively as I struggled with my feelings. "That is the only trace I have been able to find of what you are supposed to have done." I slowly came back to reality with his cold words. "Where…where do we go to find out more?" His face became grimmer on the monitor. "We need to get into the Scilab database, and you and I can't do that." I sighed. I just knew this would be harder than it looked. "Who can do that?" I asked. "There are only a handful of hackers in the world that are up to it," Bass replied. "Six, to be exact. Two are imprisoned, three work for Scilab, and one is a fugitive."

"Well, we had better get started then, shouldn't we?" I told him.

(S)(S)(S)

Lan Hikari sat at his desk and sighed. Nothing seemed to be going right at the moment, and Chaud was still sleeping. Lan definitely did not want to be the one to wake his boss up, so he let Chaud rest. However, the sheer number of "Sean" sightings was immense – an incredibly large number of people had seen a man who looked like Sean, and of course every sighting had to be checked out. Lan had stayed up all night trying to assign personnel to the investigations and go through every scrap of data the massive manhunt was compiling. He rubbed the black bags under his eyes tiredly, aware of his dropping energy level, and thought about the path that had led him here.

Scilab had started out as just a research institution, but had grown far beyond that, first with the introduction of the Officials, then the special-action teams of Operations. It was an independent agency of the United Nations, tasked with research into and safeguarding of the Net and other advanced connective technologies. It was divided into three departments: Research, Investigations, and Operations. Research was the area where the net researchers and scientists worked on new technology, where almost every new development in electronics had started in the past couple of years. Investigations was the in-house electronic crime unit, of which the Officials were part. The various detectives, Officials, and shadowing patrols all worked under this department. The newest and smallest department was Operations, which was tasked with internal security, SWAT team missions, covert extractions, and covert actions. Each section was denoted with its own internal nickname: Research scientists were "eggs", the Investigations jocks were "wireheads", and Ops soldiers were "iron-eaters". There was a good deal of rivalry between the different departments, and the employees of each thought theirs to be the most important.

Lan had not wanted this job. Ever since he had been very young, he had harbored a dream of working for Scilab in the capacity of a scientist. However, when he applied, he was sent to Investigations. There were no openings in Research, not even for the son of the famous Yuuchiro Hikari. Instead, he worked as the electronics specialist in Investigations, closely involved with his friend and rival Eugene Chaud. Lan had a large amount of expertise in investigations, as a result of breaking up Netcrime rings so many times, but his first love was science. He longed to make the switch to Research, but was patiently biding his time until he could reapply for a vacant position.

One of the things Lan hated about his job was the amount of time it was taking up. He hardly had any social life anymore – it was all he could do to scrounge a little time to see Mayl every now and then. He frequently spent eighteen hours a day in the office when Chaud needed someone with his unique skills. Since the Obihiro case had begun, he had never left the office, not even to sleep. He was nearing the end of his rope.

There was a stirring on the couch at the other end of the room as Chaud groaned, then sat up on the cushions. He rubbed his eyes tiredly and yawned. "How long did I sleep?" he groaned. Lan looked up at him. "You got a full night's sleep over there, probably about eleven hours. It's just past six in the morning." Chaud ran a hand through his mussed hair and shuffled over to the desk. "Coffee?" he asked. Lan jerked his head towards the pot that sat on his bookshelf. Chaud poured himself a cup, snagged a donut from the box lying open on the desk, and looked over Lan's shoulder at his computer screen. "Anything new?" Lan grinned wearily. "Sean's been sighted in a hundred and twenty-one different places, from Long Island to Los Angeles. I've been assigning people to investigate each one individually. You know, you would think with the advent of all this technology…" "Yeah," Chaud answered.

The monitor suddenly lit up as Megaman and Protoman returned to the computer. "Finally," sighed Lan. "Did you find anything new?" Protoman frowned. "Not a thing," he answered. "No sign of him on our cameras – not surprising. We don't have them everywhere, and we don't have authorization or hacking power for private camera networks. He hasn't been sending emails. He never had much on his homepage even before this. His PET phone function is turned off, and the GPS locator is off as well. No action on his bank records. Nobody said Sean wasn't smart." The office was silent. Chaud swore quietly and pounded his fist into his hand. "Nothing, then?" Megaman shook his pixilated head. "No, nothing."

(S)(S)(S)

James Ashcroft strode up the stairs in Scilab Headquarters. He never took the elevator – that was the lazy way. James Ashcroft never did anything the lazy way; the weak did things the lazy way, and he would never be weak. No. He was one of the strong, one of the kingmakers. He had power, as the right hand of Scilab's head, chief of the Officials, and chief of Operations (or Ops, as it was known within Scilab). The thought made him smile inwardly. Oh yes, he had power, and power was to be used by the strong, for the weak were lacking in the strength to use it properly.

He turned the corner at the top of the stairs, nodded to the guard standing there, and continued to walk down the hallway, never breaking stride. A secretary walked past with some documents, casually scanned his face, then gazed at him again with veiled interest. He swept past, not deigning to notice her. He had tasks to accomplish that were more important than flirting with some little fool of a secretary. Walking along the passage, he continually scanned the passersby from behind his mirrored sunglasses. They were a useful tool, sunglasses. So important to not let the other person see your eyes…so much could be learned from the eyes…his mind wandered as his body continued on autopilot.

Ashcroft headed to one of the doors at the far end of the hall, pulled out his key card, and opened it. He was the only one with access to this door. Stepping into the chamber behind it, he removed his glasses and put his face up to the retinal scanner. The door buzzed as a smooth, accentless female voice said "Please say your name." "James Alexander Ashcroft", he confidently repeated to the microphone. The door buzzed again, then clicked and slid open. He stepped into the next room and finally came to the door he was looking for, a large, thick slab of oak that swung smoothly Sopen on oiled hinges. He gently closed the heavy door, holding the handle so that the latch only made a slight click.

David Yamata, the reclusive head of Scilab, was leaning back in his leather office chair. His eyebrows rose slightly at this intrusion, but he held his peace. He self-consciously ran a hand through his silver hair as he stood from behind his massive oak desk. "Hello, James," he said to the brawny black man standing before him. "What news do you bring me? Surely you have not already taken Obihiro?"

Ashcroft permitted himself the faintest ghost of a smile, almost imperceptible even to Yamata's practiced eye. "No, not as good as that. It is good, though. I just received word that we know where Tamsin Brown is hiding. We should be able to pick her up early tomorrow morning." David Yamata's face darkened. "Excellent," he said, with a macabre grin. "You know, I approached her a while back about inclusion in the Project." Ashcroft inclined his head slightly. "I did not know. What became of that?" Yamata frowned. "She was…rather disinclined to assist. She preferred receiving money to doing the job for only the truth's sake. I represented to her the grave dangers inherent in such an approach, the imminent chance of capture by the authorities. She nevertheless chose to follow her perilous path, and I had no choice but to reveal some of her activities to the right people. Then, as you know, she vanished into thin air before she could be taken care of." He reflected for a moment. "Perhaps it was for the best that she did not join us. Despite her undeniable talents, she was not pure enough for our cause." James Ashcroft merely nodded at that. Yamata cleared his throat. "Who will you put on the retrieval team?" "We have Team 2, Rodriguez's group, ready to go at a moment's notice," Ashcroft replied. "They will handle the actual retrieval. We borrowed Regal and Stafford, a couple of eggs, to coordinate the phone and Net taps. Rodriguez will handle the operation – he will be the op coordinator, probably sitting in a van in a side street while the ops guys go in. It should be foolproof – by this time tomorrow, I plan on having Tamsin Brown in a very secure holding cell downstairs."

(S)(S)(S)

Doctor Thomas Regal was very surprised to be summoned upstairs into the briefing room. He had never been there before – he had thought that it was only for Ops people or Officials. He entered the room nervously, his hands unconsciously adjusting his loose tie. As he stepped through the doorway, he paused to look over those present. There seemed to be several iron-eaters, distinguished by their heavy layers of muscle, sitting around the table already. At the head of the table stood a tall, strong-looking black man, wearing mirrored sunglasses. That had to be James Ashcroft; the mirrored shades were one of his many eccentricities, and the subject of countless interoffice jokes. There were two chairs unfilled. As Regal moved to sit down, the door flew open again and Doctor Charles Stafford stuck his cadaverous, acne-pocked face through the opening. "A-a-am I l-late?" he stuttered, walking to the last chair. "No, Dr. Stafford, you are not. Shall we commence?" said Ashcroft. One of the iron-eaters muttered something under his breath about "pencil-necked eggheads", but was silenced when Ashcroft's cold face turned towards him, the glare apparent even behind his sunglasses.

"Gentlemen," he started, "just a few minutes ago, I received intelligence of the whereabouts of Tamsin Brown. This name will probably not be familiar to most of you, but she is one of the foremost hackers in the world. Her illegal activities have caused untold harm to many European countries and even the United States. For a long time now, she has been stealing the secrets of these countries and selling them to her employers. Who her employers are we can only speculate, based on rumors and hearsay, but they seem to include such rogue nations as North Korea, Iran, and China, and possibly terrorist groups as well." He paused to let that sink in. "Ms. Brown has caused much harm to the interests of the civilized world, and Scilab has been asked to put a stop to it by the United Nations. Up until now, we have not had any idea of where she may have been hiding. However, today we received word that she is living in Madrid. The folders sitting in front of you contain all of the information necessary for this retrieval operation. Your mission, as stated to me by Director Yamata, is to covertly apprehend Ms. Brown, put her onto the waiting Scilab charter plane, and escort her back here to be placed in one of the holding cells. Is that clear?" Emphatic nods ensued all around the table. "You have tickets on the first available flight to Madrid in those folders. Your flight leaves in two hours. Grab your overnight bags from home, come back here, board the van an hour from now, and head to the airport. You can skip straight through security. Move it, men!"

Regal headed out of the room in a daze. He had never been brought in for an operation of this type before. But a hacker…ah, it made sense now. They needed someone who could set up a Net surveillance. Hmmm… He started to run through the checklist of things that he needed to bring for the op, but was rudely jolted out of his reverie by the vibration of his PET. "You've got mail!" said Axl, his Navi. "Can I check it for you, Doctor?" He chuckled. "Go ahead, Axl," he said. "Tell me what it says." Axl paused. "It's a secure, you're gonna have to open it yourself." A secure? Regal's brow furrowed. He pulled the PET from the holster on his hip and opened the email screen. Oh, boy. It's Sean. Let's see what he has to say. He typed in the passcode and scanned his fingerprint for the system, and the message popped up on the screen.

Regal,

Please advise as to the status of one Tamsin Brown – is there anything about her in the Scilab files? Need to enlist her services.

S.O.

Regal swore violently as he began to type a reply on the miniature keyboard.

(S)(S)(S)

In the old WWW fortress, Sean felt the PET begin to vibrate on his hip. He checked the message manually, as Bass was still on the mainframe searching for information. His eyes hardened as he scanned the contents, then reread the missive more carefully. "Bass!" he snapped. Bass's head filled the wall screen. "Yes, Sean?" "Jack out! We're going to Madrid."

So what do you think so far? Read and review, because it makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside. Tune in next chapter to see what happens once the action really gets rolling.