Contacts [complete]

[Vigilante]

Virginia Hayes, formerly Sergeant Hayes of the United States Army, 75th Ranger Regiment, deployed in Iraq in 2003, served two tours before being shipped off to South Korea to babysit the DMZ until an honorable discharge in late 2005... Virginia Hayes was sitting on her sleek black Harley Davidson motorcycle in Bee Canyon Park in Granada Hills, waiting for her contact.

She adjusted her sunglasses, looking into the park that was showing signs of defeat against the hot summer already. Scrubby brush lined the paths and scraggly trees afforded a little shade for the few who frequented the pocket park. Virginia looked at her watch, and then up at the entrance to the small parking lot as a pair of black SUVs rolled in, windows tinted like a bad cliche.

She swung her leg off her bike and made sure her helmet was secured to the back, standing beside it waiting for the contents of the SUVs to make their move before she did anything else.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

The SUVs swung into the unmarked spaces next to the motorcycle. Each one disgorged a pair of soldiers in gray fatigues and body armor, and from the nearer of the two vehicles stepped a slender woman in a green Army service uniform with black gloves.

"Sergeant Hayes," Major Keller said with hands clasped behind her back. "It's good to see you face-to-face again."

[Vigilante]

"Major Keller," Virginia said, her spine automatically straightening, but there was no urge to salute. She was not in uniform, and no longer active duty anyway.

She stood casually, her motorcycle behind her, and she wondered if she should offer to shake hands with the Major. No, probably not. "I'm afraid I don't remember much of our first meeting." She eyed the four Vanguard soldiers that were fanned out in a vaguely defensive arc around the Major.

"Are we expecting trouble?"

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"Always," Kenzie replied. "No particular leads today, but things have been pretty hot since the rally. Would you care to join us, Sergeant? These troops will stay here to look after your motorcycle."

She gestured back to the open door of the SUV she'd just vacated. There were still two soldiers inside - one at the wheel and one in the passenger's seat.

[Vigilante]

Virginia shrugged and ducked into the vehicle. "The rally certainly could have gone off better," she said, but her tone was neutral.

Major Keller climbed into the SUV and closed the door behind her. It was cool inside, though only when compared to the July afternoon outside. "What is this meeting about, exactly?"

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

Kenzie buckled her shoulder belt, and the SUV pulled out of its spot and back onto the road, leaving the other vehicle behind. Now they were just one more car on the LA streets, lost in the anonymity of the herd.

"The last time you contacted us, you said you may have found a lead on our missing agent, Zero," the major said. "I don't need to stress to you how important it is that we recover it. What have you learned?"

[Vigilante]

She sat back in the seat, belatedly pulling her own seatbelt across her body and buckling it down as they pulled onto Balboa. "It has been sighted in Los Santos, most reliably seen about four weeks ago. I have another lead however, from only thirteen days previous. A hardware store was trashed by two people, one matching a rough description of Weapon Zero."

Virginia ran a hand through her long red hair. "I plan to follow up with a contact I made in the LAPD Mutant Crimes Unit, the ones investigating the incident. But it seems clear enough - a katana was the main weapon used and the target, who was killed, was a mutant.

"I should know more in the next few days. In this I, and the other you programmed me with, are agreed. Finding Zero is our first priority."

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

Four weeks ago - depending on how exact the figure was, that was either during or immediately after Zero's final mission before the cyborg disappeared.

"You said your most reliable sighting is from four weeks ago," Kenzie repeated. "Who's your source?"

[Vigilante]

"A kid named Cameron Bell." Virginia paused as if mentally reviewing a piece of notepaper. "He said that a month ago a friend of his was nearly killed by a black suited red-eyed cyborg." She raised her eyebrow at the 'friend' part of the sentence.

"He isn't a mutant himself, so I am inclined to believe it was a friend. He seems to think he can find it again, though, and wanted Ginny's help. And we are glad to provide it. I will, of course, keep Vanguard as in the loop as I can, but... she is always problematic when it comes to that."

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"Don't worry about that," Kenzie replied. "We can drop enough clues to keep her headed in the right direction."

The major glanced out the window as they pulled up to a stoplight beside some kids in a Mustang convertible, their laughing voices muffled through the SUV's insulated door panels. A boy in the back seat prodded the girl beside him, then took a big gulp from his water bottle, tilted his head back, and sprayed a mist into the air that sprinkled down over the car as snowflakes. Then the light changed, and the Mustang swung a left with tires spinning, leaving the snowflakes to disintegrate on the boiling pavement.

"We should arrange an interview with this Cameron Bell," the major said. "It's possible this mutant friend of his was the one Zero was sent to find before it went missing. See if you... or Ginny... can find out anything more about him. If Zero is still operating, it's possible someone else is giving it orders. We need to be sure it's not the Brotherhood."

[Vigilante]

Virginia nodded. "Yes, of course." She looked sideways at the Major, all smartly pressed and hair tightly pulled back, and then turned to face her a little more fully. "If you don't mind me asking, we could have done this over the phone. Why the face to face meeting?"

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"I was in the area," Kenzie replied with a slight elevation of her chin that only just suggested a joke. Another woman might have smiled or even winked. Major Keller was not another woman.

"But you're right, of course," she said. "To be perfectly blunt, I'm here to check up on you. It's been almost three years since we recruited you. That's a long time to share a body with another consciousness. Even an artificial one. How are you feeling, Virginia? Do you have any reason to believe that Ginny suspects the truth?"

[Vigilante]

She shook her head. "She's very ignorant. I have to admit I find it difficult to allow Ginny to control my body for such long stretches of time... but of course I knew what I was signing up for and the why of it."

Virginia shrugged. "Everything seems to be working as planned. Why? My missions have all gone without a hitch... as far as I am aware." The idea that something might be malfunctioning in her brain without her knowing was an unsettling one, and her brow creased.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"I can assure you, we have no issues with your performance," Kenzie said. "Think of this as a routine debriefing. I need only to examine the Ginny persona and make certain she's not encroaching on your memories."

Kenzie delicately began to remove one of her black cotton gloves. "We don't take lightly the sacrifice you're making. Once your current assignment is over and you no longer need to operate under deep cover, I will personally recommend to General Vasher that the Ginny persona be expunged completely. But for now, we still need both of you."

The major folded the glove neatly in her lap and extended her bare hand toward Virginia. "This won't hurt a bit, Sergeant."

[Vigilante]

She looked at the outstretched hand as if it were a snake, and then nodded. "Fine. But make it quick, if you can, her friend Aimee keeps texting me about dinner."

Virginia shifted against her seatbelt and added, "Should I hold your hand or do you... Vulcan mind meld me or something?"

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"Any skin contact will do," Kenzie replied. "I promise you'll be aware of everything I'm doing."

[Vigilante]

Virginia nodded, and then after another moment of hesitation held out her hand, palm up. Major Keller placed her hand over it, making eye contact with her continuously until she pressed her hand down, making contact.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

There was the familiar sensation of falling into herself that had become second nature to Kenzie by now. The car and the busy summer streets of Los Angeles were swallowed up in darkness, and an infinite grid of old cement-and-plate-glass skyscrapers rose up in their place. The streets were empty, the clouds moved too fast across the twilight sky, and all the street signs showed shifting symbols, like the gibberish of a digital display in a dream. It was quiet, deathly quiet, the silence of a city with one inhabitant.

Virginia walked alongside Kenzie down to the end of the block, past the pawn shop with the windows covered in chain link barriers, and around the corner to the brick facade with the ramp and garage doors and the spray-painted logo that read Vigilante Customs. There was a frame in the wall with a glassed-in outer door and a solid inner door with a hanging sign that said CLOSED.

Kenzie reached for the door handle, and it rattled uselessly in her hand. Frowning, she turned to Virginia. "It's locked. Do you mind?"

[Vigilante]

Virginia stared at the garage blankly for a moment, and pulled a chain from around her neck. A key dangled off of it, and she used it to open the door. The inner door was also locked, but the same key worked, and Hayes stepped back to let Major Keller enter first.

This place gave her the creeps. The garage was clean, but not overly so, it certainly looked worked in and there were motorcycle parts all over the place, as well as a completed chopper in the center of the room. Virginia crossed her arms and stood awkwardly in the otherwise empty garage, feeling distinctly uncomfortable and like she didn't belong. These weren't her things... this was not her mind.

Its just a construct, she reminded herself, but the fact that a constructed personality would accumulate so much stuff and become so comfortable in Virginia's mind was unnerving.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

The garage was sepulchral in its silence. Kenzie's shoes echoed sharply as she crossed around behind the workbench to the brick wall at the back of the room.

Kenzie looked back at Virginia over her shoulder. "Seeing me will undoubtedly trigger the false memories of her incarceration," she said. "It's best if she doesn't see you."

With that warning the major placed her hand against the brick wall, and a section of it glowed white and disappeared. Behind it was a cell of concrete and plexiglass with a medical chair at the center. Seated in the chair, fastened with arm, leg, and body restraints, was the slumbering form of Ginny Hayes.

Kenzie stepped inside the cell, and the illusion sealed behind her. Virginia could see in, but Ginny could not see out.

"Wake up, Ginny," Major Keller said. "It's time to talk."

[Vigilante]

Ginny opened her eyes at the sound of her name, staring blankly for a moment and then focusing on her surroundings. "You," she rasped, then cleared her throat as best she could. The collar that circled her neck was a cold reminder of how helpless she was.

She looked around as best she could, and then returned her gaze to Major Keller. "What did you do to me?"

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

Kenzie stepped around the supine Ginny, glancing over the medical instruments that whirred away against the back wall. Their readouts were a blur of shifting lines and symbols that didn't mean anything, and the video screen in the corner played a loop of fractured memories - riding a motorcycle down a desert highway, a little girl with a birthday cake, taking off in a Blackhawk helicopter, a desperate struggle with a red-eyed cyclops.

"I opened your eyes," Kenzie replied. She paced back into Ginny's view, her hands clasped behind her back. They were bare.

"You've been dreaming for a long time, Sergeant. What's the last thing you remember?"

[Vigilante]

She blinked slowly, her eyes flicking from Major Keller to the blank walls of the room in front of her. "We were here. You... you put your hands on my head."

Ginny's breathing quickened, and then she shook her head slightly. "No, wait - I remember talking to Aimee... about..." The memories came flooding back, filling up the screen behind her with vivid flashes. "I didn't remember being here, but I do now. I remember the thing that attacked me, that brought me here." She was unconsciously straining against the bonds that held her to the reinforced dentist's chair.

"Why...? Why me?"

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

Kenzie turned and stood at ease before the imprisoned woman. "Because you volunteered."

[Vigilante]

"Fuck that," Ginny growled. "I did no such thing. You had me taken from my home and brought here against my will, wiped my memories..." Her voice trailed off and she looked around.

"Why am I back here? How come I can remember...?" Ginny began to stare hard at the woman in front of her and the rest of the sterile room environment, trying to force her brain to retain what it could suddenly recall with such clarity.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"As a matter of fact, you aren't back here," Kenzie replied, and she ran her hand over one of the flickering monitors. "This place is a projection of your subconscious. I might have walked in to find you in your bedroom, or in your tent in Iraq. But your subconscious is dwelling here. That's interesting."

Hands clasped once more, the major circled around the back of Ginny's chair. "Ginny, would you say you are feeling particularly trapped by your circumstances?"

[Vigilante]

"Uh, no, not at all, now that you mention it." Ginny strained to keep her eyes on the other woman, but was thwarted by her restraints. "No shit, Sherlock. You must be some sort of genius."

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

Kenzie continued her circle around the woman, and her eyes were on the false wall where Virginia stood looking in from the other side.

"You should know by now that we are not in the physical world. Everything here has a symbolic meaning. You are a woman who can be anywhere just by thinking it, and yet, here, where the mind creates its own reality, you are trapped in this room. Why do you think that is?"

[Vigilante]

"You did something to me," she replied promptly. "You've trapped me here by taking my memories..." Ginny glared, still a little confused by the memories she could now access, and the remembrance of when there was nothing but a blank spot.

"The time I spent here is practically all I can think about. Even if I couldn't remember it."

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

Kenzie looked down at Ginny with something that almost approached pity. So she did understand.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry for what we've put you through," the major said. "I can only hope that, in time, you'll come to see why it was necessary. If it were up to me, I'd have you as a fellow soldier. But right now, we need you frightened and desperate. We need the Vigilante."

She stepped toward Ginny and held out her hand. The woman recoiled in her restraints.

"You're going to go back to sleep, Ginny," Kenzie said. "You're going to forget this conversation. You're going to forget that I exist. But I want you to remember who holds the key to your freedom."

She pressed the palm of her hand against Ginny's forehead, and all the monitors in the room displayed the same cyclopean mask.

[Vigilante]

No! Ginny struggled to move her head away from the Major's touch, but was helpless as the cool hand was placed on her skin. Don't forget, don't forget, don't forget no no forget forget...

Forget...

Ginny's eyes closed, the red eye of the Zero's helmeted face burned into her retinas.

Virginia paced impatiently on the other side of the wall Major Keller had put in place. When the other woman emerged from the white cell where the construct resided, she stalked over to her. "Well? Satisfied?"

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

As she stepped into the customs shop, Kenzie rubbed her hands as if trying to squeeze warmth back into her fingers. Her hands always felt cold after she used her gifts, even when she was already in someone's subconscious. Which meant rubbing her hands here was pointless, because when they came out of innerspace and returned to the backseat of the SUV, her hands would still be cold. The mind played funny tricks on the body.

"I needed to make sure her motivations were still in order," Kenzie said. "She'll do what we need her to do."

The major's eyes wandered around the garage. On the way in, she'd only registered it as scenery, but it was quite exhaustive in its detail. It was a nexus of organized chaos - a rack of motorcycle frames and forks, a dolly full of engine parts, an upright toolbox rolled into the central workspace near a shining specimen of cherry red and glistening chrome.

"Sergeant, does the name 'Vigilante Customs' mean anything to you?"

[Vigilante]

Virginia looked around, and shrugged. "Not particularly."

She ran a finger along the sleek lines of the custom bike, looking at it with appreciation. "I like this chopper, though. Been thinking about repainting mine red." She looked up. "Is that important? The name?"

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"Maybe, maybe not," Kenzie replied, giving the bike a ten-mile stare. "This place is in a prominent part of Ginny's subconscious. It seems strange that she would have put her prison here..."

Before she could elaborate, a rumble arose from the painted floor beneath their feet, and the florescent lights overhead began to rattle and sway. Behind them, a whole rack full of parts slid sideways off their shelves and spilled onto the floor with a ringing crash, and a shrieking noise like the squeal of tires on hot asphalt tore through the sky outside.

"Something's wrong." Kenzie threw Virginia a look of urgency. "We need to get out of here."

Then gravity let go, and both women went tumbling toward the far wall of the garage followed by half a ton of pipe frames and engine blocks. Kenzie lunged in mid-air for Ginny's hand, and the whole garage and the city beyond went white and insubstantial, and there was a moment of disorienting vertigo -

Kenzie was thrown against her shoulder belt as the SUV wheeled hard to the left, its tires screaming on the sticky pavement. She shook herself awake, still fuzzy from her incursion into Ginny's mind, and flinched as a bullet splashed against the armored glass of the window by her head.

"What's going on?" she croaked.

"Gang, could be Brotherhood," the driver replied in deadpan. The soldier in the passenger seat was watching the mirrors and had a radio in his hand.

"Mobile Four to Vanguard One, we have been fired upon, repeat, we have been fired upon, proceeding north on Mondeo Boulevard. Hostiles in pursuit."

[Vigilante]

Virginia clutched at the seat and car door as the vehicle swerved wildly around a corner at the last minute. She twisted around to look behind them, getting a brief look at a dusty sedan with an arm and a gun hanging out of the passenger side window. The back window of the SUV splattered a few more bullets as the radio squawked and the Vanguard guys yelled.

She felt uncomfortably hot. It was too much like Iraq. Her fingers tightened on the back of the seat until her knuckled were white, and she turned to face the front again just as a garbage truck wandered into the road.

"Get out of the way!" the driver cursed, slamming on the breaks to avoid a collision. Virginia ground her teeth as the truck stopped as well, blocking the road.

The doors opened, and men got out. She reached for a side arm she didn't have. Dammit.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

The back of the garbage truck disgorged a half dozen people, male and female. They were dressed like the dregs of humanity, but one woman's feathery scalp and the nearby male's bare, scaley arms confirmed that they were anything but human. They formed up against the Vanguard troops, menacing despite their apparent lack of weapons.

The troopers opened fire and immediately took down the truck's driver, but a woman in the main group sent the rest of the bullets ricocheting down the street with a sweep of her arm. A young man with hate in his sunken eyes stepped forward and stomped on the asphalt, opening up a fault in the road that snaked quickly toward the Vanguard SUV. The car lurched and dropped a good two feet into the widening fissure, and one of the gray-armored troopers lost balance and slipped in, screaming as the SUV rolled onto his leg.

The Vanguard driver cursed and grabbed an SMG from under the dash. "It's Freakwatch, Ma'am," he said. "Bunch of Brotherhood wannabes. We'll be filling up some more cells in the Jozua Clinic tonight."

Kenzie grabbed for her sidearm and leaned to push open her passenger side door, but the driver reached back and put a hand on her arm. "No, Ma'am. We're going to have to use nectar rounds. That means you and Sergeant Hayes need to go."

Major Keller's eyes blazed as she watched another Vanguard trooper go down with three spikes stuck in his shoulder armor. Two more spikes sank halfway into the reinforced windshield.

Kenzie glanced over at Virginia and grabbed her arm. "Port us out of here," she ordered.

[Vigilante]

'Porting quickly in succession usually made people sick. However, simply teleporting thirty-three feet would not be far enough. Virginia clamped her hands down on Major Keller's forearms and suddenly they were in another Place.

And that Place was crawling with creatures from some Lovecraftian nightmare. "Holy shit!" Virginia pulled Keller down to the misty, crystalline ground as a tentacle with an enormous hooked claw swept over where their heads had been.

She closed her eyes and concentrated...

...and the pair of mutants popped back into Los Angeles in the middle of a grassy park. A kid on the nearby playground shrieked at their sudden appearance, but Virginia was more concerned with the state of her CO. "Are you okay?"

She looked down at her hands, and abruptly released the other woman and pushed herself back to her feet.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

Kenzie's sense of equilibrium was still in the crippled SUV on Mondeo Boulevard. She ground her fingers into the thirsty grass, unsure for a moment if it was ground, wall, or ceiling, and when she tried to push herself upright she overbalanced and rolled onto her side. The sky overhead was blindingly bright, and even in the open park she felt an overwhelming sense of claustrophobia, and it was all she could do to raise herself on hands and knees before she vomited onto the grassy lawn.

[Vigilante]

Virginia looked down on her, and offered a belated "Sorry. That, uh, happens sometimes."

She looked around and focused on the playground, where children were being gathered up by their mothers, or nannies, or whoever. "C'mon, we're making the natives uncomfortable." She got her hands under Keller's armpits and dragged her upright, towing her toward the concrete structure that proclaimed it was a bathroom.

And it was, of course, locked. Leaving Kenzie against the wall sucking air, Virginia pulled herself up to look in through a tiny rectangular window just under the roofline that was covered with a strong mesh. After 'spotting the landing' as it were, she disappeared in a cloud of sulfuric purple smoke and reappeared inside the women's restroom. Forcing the lock and opening the door, she beckoned the sick Major inside.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"Thanks," Kenzie gasped as she stumbled inside. The lights flickered on in time for her to find the nearest sink and spit out the last few mouthfuls of bile, and then she snatched some clean paper towels out of a nearby dispenser to wipe around her mouth.

"What the hell was that?"

[Vigilante]

"Good question," Virginia said, looking at Keller in the cracked mirror. "I believe they're called Astral Demons, though I've never seen one that close up before.

"And never that many at once." She looked around the concrete room and empty stalls, feeling uncomfortable that one of those things was likely hovering around just the other side of the dimensional divide.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"Astral... Demons?" Kenzie said. The superstitious overtones left a taste in her mouth almost as bad as the remains of this morning's breakfast.

She coughed into the paper towels and wadded them up to throw into a wastebasket. The major had recovered her equilibrium, even though her face was still peaked and waxy. "Do you mean we were on the Astral Plane? I've read reports of it, but nothing officially corroborated..."

Kenzie rubbed at her forehead. Whatever that place had done to her, it had felt like an all-nighter with no sleep, the world's worst hangover, and waking up from the dreams you had with a fever of 104, all of them at once.

"I've never felt like that before," she said. "It was nothing like going into innerspace. You've jumped there before? You never reported anything like this."

It was hard to keep the note of accusation out of her voice. Virginia may well have saved both their lives, but it didn't help that she felt like hell.

[Vigilante]

Virginia raised an eyebrow. "I thought about trying to explain it in a report, but I barely understand it myself. Somehow I am able to teleport directly to the Astral Plane. Once there I can then 'port anywhere on the globe. Or," she shuddered, "possibly other places too."

She looked behind her to check for cleanliness, and then leaned against the wall next to a broken hand dryer. "I can only physically 'port thirty-three feet. I also need to be able to see where I'm going to end up, or have a good idea of what it looks like, to make sure I don't end up in a wall or a piece of furniture. But going into another dimension means a 'port that has no physical distance.

"And then 'porting out again is just another... sideways step." She grimaced. "See, it makes no sense. I don't know how I do it, just that I can. And we needed to get out fast. There wasn't time..."

Virginia shrugged. "From what I hear, going to the Astral Plane in the flesh is extremely dangerous. So don't start thinking I'm going to take people on field trips to it."

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

Kenzie straightened herself up and tried to roll the tension out of her shoulders. "I didn't even know going there in the flesh was possible. I'd assumed it was an altered state of consciousness, not a physical--"

She was interrupted by a squelch from the radio on her hip. "Sergant Dugan to Major Keller. Ma'am, are you okay?"

Kenzie snatched the radio from her belt and flipped on the two-way. "Keller here. Sergeant Hayes and I are fine. What's your situation?"

"Situation pacified. All hostiles have been neutralized and collared, and we have a clean-up crew inbound to take them away. Hawke and Sutters were injured, but they're both back on their feet."

Kenzie's face hardened at the memory of the SUV rolling onto a man's leg. It was a testament to the mutagen project that he could shrug off such an injury and jump right back into the fight.

"Glad to hear it. Finish up there, and I'll signal you to pick me up once I've found my bearings."

"Yes ma'am."

Kenzie replaced her radio and found Virginia watching her expectantly.

"It's a pleasure to work with Vanguard's finest," the major said. "Yourself included, Sergeant. Your quick thinking deserves a commendation. I can debrief you about your experiences in the Astral Plane later, but your current mission is still our top priority."

[Vigilante]

"I can't wait," she muttered, and took a deep breath. "I need to get back to my bike. Ginny has a dinner to get to in a couple hours."

Virginia paused. "The other personality - she is in... hibernation or something while I'm active?" She shook her head and held up her hands. "You know what, never mind. It all works, I don't need another headache trying to figure it out." She rubbed her temples.

[Major Mackenzie Keller]

"She's been conditioned not to question the gaps in her memory," Kenzie replied. "Well, aside from the most important one, that is." She looked into the mirror and pressed a few errant hairs back into place. "It's amazing what the mind will fill in, given the chance. Memory is much more a subconscious construction than most people realize."

With a bracing breath, she was herself again. She turned toward Virginia with impeccable polish. "I can give you another hour to return to your hotel room," she said. "Then I'll call you with the signal to wake her up. Good hunting, Virginia."

[Vigilante]

"Thank you, sir." Virginia saluted, and then 'ported out of the bathroom. The Astral Plane was thick with demons, much worse than she'd ever seen, and she didn't fancy using it to get to her abandoned motorcycle. After a few strung together teleports that used up most of her remaining energy, she wondered if it was worth the risk.

Then she remembered the scythe claw of the astral demon as it had passed just above her, and shuddered. Nope. She pulled out her phone and called for a taxi. Virginia waited in the minimal shade of a date palm, arms crossed and leaning against the rough trunk. Making contact with the Zero biotic was not going to be easy.

And no matter what Major Keller said, she wasn't sure she trusted a construct to be able to make the right decisions in a fight. Even if Ginny was still 'her', just a her that didn't really exist. Virginia rubbed her temples to ward off a tension headache. The next few weeks were going to be very interesting.