The first two days of tracking Lebel lead to nothing interesting, his steps were exactly the same, and with how he had handled their interview, it seemed more like he was a creature of habit then someone who was working for an evil mastermind.  The third day started off differently, however.  The night before Ace had wanted to go back to the hotel room figuring that they’d have no troubles picking up Lebel the following morning at the lab.  This had sounded like a good idea to both of them as the limited sleep they had gotten in the car was starting to wear on their nerves.  And while both had taken the opportunity during the first work day to run back to the hotel room and shower, neither had done so the second day and they were regretting it today.

At the last minute, Maverick had insisted that they follow Lebel completely for one more day.  They had taken shifts loitering outside of Lebel’s apartment complex and each had run back to take a shower, they were barely awake when Lebel came out of the apartment and headed down the street.  It looked like it was going to be a normal day, and Ace groaned.

“We should have slept.  I need more than 5 hours of sleep in 72 hours.”

“You dozed for about an hour yesterday afternoon that you aren’t counting.  And don’t you remember that one mission in France, that was over 100 hours on 6-7 hours of sleep.”

“Yes, but that was the war.”

“This could be bigger.”

“Watching someone go to their lab…”

Lebel turned down a different street than normal, and away from his lab.  He sat down at a cafe that was still closed, but had a few tables out on the street corner.  He watched a few cars drive past on the main road a few blocks away.  Maverick, unprepared for this change of plans rolled past the cafe and then turned down a side street.  Once they were out of view, he parked the car and they headed on foot to observe the cafe.

They got to the corner, and keeping out of sight tried to covertly watch what Lebel was doing.  He was sitting at the table and there was a man dressed in a dreary grey colored trench coat sitting across from him.  He was wearing a brown hat that was pulled down to cover his face.  They talked for a few minutes in hushed tones and Lebel nodded and got up and left.  A minute later the stranger followed in the same direction back towards the lab.  Ace followed them on foot while Maverick ran back and got the car.

“We know, we were over seas for the war.”

“Ah, where?”

“All around, England, France, and Germany.”

“In the military?”

“Yes.”

“As reporters?”

Maverick shot Ace a look.

“Yes, as embedded reporters, we traveled with the military.”

Ace nodded in agreement.

“Yes, that was a mistake, but like any technology, it can fall into the wrong hands.”

“Are you worried about that with this technology?”

“Yes, and no.  I suppose it could be dangerous if it falls into the wrong hands, but so can a car, and we don’t ban those, we have tests, we have regulations, we have bodies governing them.  So while we must be cautious, we can’t give up on the future, if that makes sense?”

“Yes, I believe that it does.”

“Does all your staff know the full project?”

“Why do you ask that?”

“Oh, Asha was just saying you were here before her ever day and left after her.  So we just want to know if you are keeping elements separate or if you are working on this as a whole.”

“I see, Asha talks to much, but a good receptionist should, just about small talk.  But I do understand the question, a project like this, something so great shouldn’t be left all in one place, and while I do know everything about it, and my collaborating scientist…”

“Whom ma I ask?”

“You can ask, but he has request anonymity until the completion of the project, which is okay with me.”

“More recognition for you.”

“Yes, you could say that.  Back to what I was saying though, a project of this importance isn’t worked on in a single location as some elements are easier to work with that their location, and some places, like this lab, are much better equipped for some of the more refined work.”

Lebel looked at the clock, it was getting close to one in the afternoon.

“Gentlemen, I’m afraid I must get back to my work, I hope these questions were able to give you more insight for your article.”

“Yes.”

Ace stood to leave.  Maverick reached into his pocket and grew out the two pieces of wire and set them on the table.  Lebel looked at them and up at them with a worried look on his face.  Maverick and Ace pretended not to notice.

“We were given these as an example of technology that you might be working with, can you confirm this, we just want to verify our source is correct and that they are some sort of radio technology.”

“Who is your source?”

Lebel forced himself to sound calm.

“Sorry, we can’t reveal our sources.”

Lebel picked on up and looked at it.

“I can’t say whether or not this is something that could be involved in my project.  But this is radio technology.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, let me show you out.”

Maverick put the pieces of wire back into his pocket and Lebel led them out.

“Thank you again.”

Lebel nodded and closed the door behind them.  They walked back in silence to the car and headed back to the hotel.

Going in the main entrance, the building was spotless, the walls were white and shined from the harsh lights of the laboratory.  There was a desk with a receptionist standing besides it.  Ace introduced himself and it was quickly apparent that the receptionist was there only for her looks, she knew nothing about the what the projects were and knew nothing about the radio technology that Maverick had identified.  After about 15 minutes of talking and flirting, Ace was able to convince her to let them talk with Lebel.  He came out and talked with them for less than a minute.  He looked harried and like he hadn’t gotten a full nights sleep in days.

“Sir, we’re from the New York Times and were wondering if we could do a story about your laboratory?”

“Ah yes, that is what Asha told me, I’m afraid I’m very busy right now.”

“Would you have a few questions that we’d like ask you.”

“I’m sorry, I’m very busy.”

Ace opened his mouth, but Maverick tapped him on his arm.  Ace shut up and Maverick took over talking.

“Sir, we were very impressed with your talk in New York City about the effects of advertising and how to use it influence the consumer.  It was one of the more fascinating talks that I’ve heard.”

“I appreciate that.”

“I was wondering if we could have an hour of your time whenever you might be free to ask you more about it.”

“I’m very busy.”

“We understand, if you have a few minutes of time, any time you have would be appreciated.”

“I might be able to set aside some time around noon if that works for you gentlemen.”

“Thank you, that would be much appreciated.”

“Yes, thank you.”

Ace and Maverick left the lab and watched like the previous day from out in the street.  Lebel moved a bit faster and seemed to work a bit faster, but that was it, there was no noticeable change in his behavior.  Just before noon they pulled awa from the curb and drove again around the block twice before parking again.  No one appeared to be watching them, but the weren’t going to risk any lapses in their cover.

They walked in ten minutes before noon and Ace proceeded to flirt with the receptionist until the Lebel joined them and invited them to go back into his office.

“What can I help you with?”

“Sir, we want to talk to you about the influence of radio in advertising on the general populace.  How did you start studying this line of research?”

“Well, it was something that I had dabbled in during my time in Russia, classified military radio projects, you can understand why I can’t say, but lets say they dealt primarily with long range transmissions during World War II, if that doesn’t give anything away.”

“We understand that, sir.  What can you tell us about our current project?”

Just before the door would open for number two, Person one went and sat down.  He watched the silhouettes as person two and three entered the room.  There was no difference in their walk or their shape that person one could tell.  It wasn’t until Person four showed up that there was a difference.  The big man that was normal was gone.  You could tell with the swagger that it was still the same person, but the weight loss was noticeable and there was a slight hitch in his step.  He also didn’t seem as tall as before, like he was hunched over.  He sat down in his corner and there was silence in the room.

As was tradition, Person one spoke first.

“Who called the meeting?”

There was a cough for Person Four.  “I did.”

“It has been three months since the last time.”

“Yes it has.”

“Who killed my driver?”

There was a moment of silence.  Everyone knew that there were going to be questions.  Person one had been gone from the room as was person two by the time of the shots, but it was unknown if person three had been out of the room.  With person four having been shot, it seemed like the shooting had happened in the room.

“The man in black.”

There was silence again.  Person one had suspected it was the man in black, but hadn’t been able to confirm it through any of his sources.  Not knowing who was in the room with him obviously made that difficult.  Person one noted that there wasn’t any coughing yet, normally the air in the basement seemed to cause problems for person three.

“What happened?”

“Who led him here?”

The questions were almost instantaneous from person two and three.  Person one wasn’t surprised, his driver had been killed and person four had been shot himself, if someone had intentionally led the man in black, it would have been person two or three would be the most likely suspects for that.  It was their job to try and deflect suspicion off of themselves.  So they were trying their best to do that.  They couldn’t seem too eager and they couldn’t wait too long, so Person one had expected them to speak at the same time, both would have a question planned and when the other started they would start.

“I don’t know, it could have been anyone, but all of us needed to review our procedures.”

Person four had done a good job of diffusing a potentially explosive situation.  It would come up again, but in a less dramatic manner, but this was something that was needed.

“Are we safe here this time?”

“I don’t know, but we needed to meet to determine if it is.”

The talk in the next twenty minutes was boring, but person one knew it was needed.  None of them would admit to a potential lapse in their travel or security, but they would hem and haw about procedure and look at new ways to making everything safer.  Once all the safety talk was done they returned to the issue of the man in black.

No one, of course claimed to have known anything about him, but it turned out that he hadn’t been seen in New York City since the two incidents.

“I haven’t had any luck finding him since he shot me.”

“He kidnapped a news reporter in New York City, something to do with a military general, don’t know who it was.”

“Any idea why she would be his target?”

“I don’t know, but she was released later that same night.”

They continued to talk for another thirty minutes, but person four was pushing for the meeting to end.  Person one noted this, Person four was being much shorter, now that he had an idea of what the man in black was after, even if it was for no reason to the man in blacks madness.

The meeting ended and they all walked away.  Person one had his new driver take them around the block several times.  He never looked out the window and no one could see in to see who he was, or his driver, but he wanted to know that there weren’t any shots this time.  After 10 minutes had gone by, they headed to the airport and person one hopped on his plane.  He picked up the in flight phone and called ahead to his office to get them to start researching this news reporter and general.  If Person four was interested in her, Person one wanted to know why, even if it was just revenge on the man in black, person one knew knowledge was power.

For being cautious and keeping his lab clean and on time, Lebel paid little attention to the outside world and paid no attention to the car that had been sitting out there the whole day with two men in it.  Instead he kept at his work busily running around from one beaker to another trying to figure out who knows what.  Maverick hypothesized that he was trying to find some way to enhance his ability to manipulate people into his own doing, but it was pure conjecture.  For the most part, Ace and Maverick’s first day of staking out Lebel had been pointless.  They returned that night to their hotel after feeling like they had wasted their team over a couple of beers.  The thunder rolled in the distance and neither paid much attention to the fact that the light was on in the room next to theirs.

—–

Earlier that day, Julia had made it down to Philadelphia.  Her first inkling had been to head to Lebel’s lab to try and find him and find Ace and Maverick before they cut her out of what might have been a really good story.  She didn’t trust Ace, and while she could respect Maverick for trying to promote his career, she wasn’t about to take it lying down.  This had been quickly halted when she realized that they weren’t likely to just rush into something.  They had left her behind in New York City because they were playing it safe.  So instead she scouted hotels on the outskirt of the city.  It took awhile and a bit of spare cash, but she had eventually found the a hotel not where either a Mr. Walker or Jones were staying, but where their deceased general friend was staying.  Julia had quickly gotten the hotel room next to it.  She waited around impatiently for them to show up from whatever they were doing, hoping that they weren’t breaking some story without her.

——

Maverick and Ace entered their hotel room to see that it had been turned upside down, in some cases literally.  Ace quickly went for his gun and cleared the hotel room while Maverick took inventory.  They had taken the bag with them, so they still had the remaining two wires, and it appeared nothing else had been taken.  While they were looking through things, there was a knock on the door.

—–

Julia looked up from her notepad, she had been starting to pen the story of the dead General and a loose connection to this mysterious scientist when there was a knock at her door.  She figured that Ace or Maverick must have seen her through the window in which she hadn’t drawn the curtains.  Putting down the pen and pencils Julia headed towards the door.  She opened it to find two men standing outside, but not Ace or Maverick, these men were dressed head to toe in black and blocked out the light from the parking lot outside.  Julia opened her mouth to scream, but got hit with a nightstick before a sound could come out.  She crumpled to the floor as the two men searched through her hotel room.

“Where is the other stuff?”

“I can’t find a sign of either of them.”

“Who else would check in next to that name?”

“I don’t know, maybe she is meeting up with Ace and Maverick later?”

“Possible.”

“Who is she anyways?”

“Hell if I know, but if she knows anything about the document we better take her in to the boss.”

“What if it’s a waste of time?”

“Damned if we do, damned if don’t, I say take her in just in case.”

“You got it.”

One of the men picked her up like a rag doll and carried her over his shoulder out the car.  He laid her down in the back seat and waited with the engine on for the other guy to come out.  The other man joined him in the car shortly carrying a few notes from Julia’s article and the copy of the article itself.

“She knows something.  Let’s go to the boss.”

“What’s the briefcase for?”

“Well, we want to look professional for the scientist, won’t we?  I figure we go in as two reporters doing a piece on him.”

“Steal that from your girlfriend?”

Maverick chuckled.

“Julia gave me the idea, and that’s all I’ll say on that matter.”

“Let’s hit the road.”

Ace pulled away from the curb.  The streets were starting to get busy and the sweepers were driving themselves back to their garages.  Maverick calculated the amount of time that it would take them to get out of the city at this time of day.  It wouldn’t be too bad, Julia, if she decided to, would have trouble catching up to them.  The drive would take just over three hours.  Their plan was to spend one day observing the scientist before they went to talk to him.

They cleared the city just as the sun started to warm up the car.  The city was now bustling about them, but they were headed in the right direction avoiding the traffic.  They made good time as they headed through New Jersey.

—–

Julia was furious as she stood outside of Ace’s apartment door.  He had left a note on the door reading: “Darling, your boyfriend decided that we’d leave earlier.  Tough luck.”  She had gotten to his apartment right at 8:30 and had been dropped off by another co-worker.  She was now stuck until the taxi she had called showed up.  Common sense was telling her to just let it be and go back to her apartment, unpack her clothes, and go to work like every other day, but that part was being drowned out by the part that was calling both Ace and Maverick a bastard and was figuring that since she had already taken the rest of the week off, she might as well just take a very expensive taxi trip down to Philadelphia.

The taxi showed up outside of the apartment doors and Julia picked up her bags and walked out towards the cab.  The Cabbie got out and took them from her and put them in to the trunk of his vehicle.

“Where to?”

“Can you take me to Philadelphia?”

“Sure, but it will cost you.”

“I’m okay with that.”

The Cabbie nodded and opened the door for Julia to get into the back seat.  He got in and pulled away from the curb as Julia settled in for the long car ride that was ahead of her.  She tried to guess what time Ace and Maverick might have left at, and where they would be staying and realized that just going to Philadelphia might not have been the smartest idea.  She looked at the note again which strengthened her resolve and she looked out the front of the cab at the traffic ahead of her which was keeping her from this mystery.

—–

Ace and Maverick hit the edge of Philadelphia and started looking for a motel to stay at.  They knew the scientist’s lab was towards downtown, but the hotels towards the edge of the city were cheaper and the owners less apt to keep records of who had been there.  Normally they wouldn’t have cared, but after two run-ins with the man in black and a mystery government document being sent their way, they weren’t taking any chances.

“Are you positive there was one?”

“What I know about radios says there had to have been one.”

“And do we need it?”

“I don’t know.  I don’t even know why you’d need the wires that big.”

“Unless you were building a big radio.”

“Doubtful, where is the professor again?”

“Atlanta.”

“That’s a bit more of a hike, I’ll need to take time off from work.”

There was a knock at the door.  Ace opened it and Julia was standing at the door again.  Maverick looked around to see if the man in black was there, but he wasn’t.

“I’m going with you.”

“Going with us where?”

Ace shook his head slightly and cut Maverick off.  His eyes were off somewhere else thinking of the war and some of his and Maverick’s battles together.  The people they had rescued and had then left when war had pushed them away.  He and Maverick had been two amigos, playing on the edges of what was allowed but always getting the job done.  They had tried early on during their time over seas to bring others into the group, but Maverick and Ace had been of like mind during the war, no one else had been able to keep up.

“Atlanta.”

“How long were you standing…”

“We aren’t going to Atlanta.”

“Yes you are, you are going after a scientist, why I don’t know, but I smell story here, and I am going with you.”  Julia turned towards Maverick.  “You won’t lie to me, are you going to Atlanta?”

“Yes.”

“Come on, we don’t know what we’ll find, this could be pointless.”

“Well, if that is the case then why do you care if I come along?”

“It could be dangerous.” Ace was standing firm and staring down Julia.  She was staring back at him without blinking.

“So is New York, and you guys proved safer to be around than other people with the man in black.”

“We almost got you killed.”

Maverick had been thinking that he wouldn’t mind if she came along, but the reminder of the man in black and him taking her captive dissuaded him from that notion.

“Maybe, but what if he comes back after me and you guys are in Atlanta, then what happens to me?”

“Fair enough.”

Maverick gave the go ahead for Julia to join them.  Ace glared at him but Maverick just shrugged his shoulders.

“It’s settled, let me go pack, I’ll be here at 8, or do you want to get on the road before then?”

“8 will work.”

Julia left the apartment closing the door behind her.  Ace locked it and glared at Maverick.

“We’d work better alone, you know that, right?”

“I…”

“That’s what we did in the war, no one could keep up with us, we knew what the other one was going to do before they thought it.”

“I know…”

“And now you bring her along without putting up a fight.”

“I KNOW.”

Ace shut up and looked at Maverick.

“Ace, do you think you can be ready to go by 6:30, and meet at my place.”

Ace grinned.

—————————————————————————————————-

“Did you ever hear of a Russian scientist named Karkov?”

“I don’t remember who the General mentioned, if anyone.”

Ace flipped over another page in the telephone book, he and Maverick had been going through it for three days, Maverick would leave for work and Ace would come to him with a list of names for him to try and remember.  Ace’s current theory on the document is that it must have come from a Russian who knew the General and was now likely living in the United States, probably in New York City.

“How about Baskov?”

“Nope, that one doesn’t ring any bells either.”

“Alright, how about your lady friend, she bring up any leads for us?”

Julia had been very helpful since her encounter and had joined their investigation from a distance, she pestered Maverick with questions, did research and gave him answers at work, but after the man in black, she avoided being seen with him outside of work.

“She says there are two Russian scientists in the area, Dvorkin and Lebel.  One is based out of Boston and the other one Philadelphia.”

“Not quite New York City.”

“No, but her research came up with those as the nearest two, and Lebel was in New York City during the time frame when the package was most likely sent.”

“What was he here for?”

“Doesn’t make sense, but a conference on radio and television advertising and how to best influence people into buying stuff, well, advertising, that is what he talked on.”

“Mind control?”

“What?”

“Isn’t persuading people to buy something a little like mind control?”

“Maybe?”

“We should go pay him a visit.”

“He isn’t in New York anymore.”

“Ready for another trip.”

“Yes…. wait.”

Ace looked at Maverick.  He has his brow furrowed and it was obvious he was on the verge of an idea.

“The wires, let me see the wires.”

“What about them?”

“Let me see them.”

Ace went into his bedroom and to a safe in the closet.  Inside the safe which he had kept his military commendations and other personal documents, he now kept only things dealing with the package.  He pulled out his rucksack and took out the two pieces of wire and returned to the living room.

“Here you go.”

Maverick looked them over carefully.  He then went to Ace’s radio and pulled off the back, much less carefully.

“I thought these looked familiar.”

“What are they?”

Maverick turned the radio around and showed Ace a set of three wires which connected the tubes together.  These were much more delicate wires than the ones that were delivered to them a couple of weeks earlier.

“So, they’re building a radio?”

“Weren’t there three in the sack?”

“No, I think just two.”

“I swear when I got the pack there were three, cause it rang a bell, but I didn’t place it until now.”

“Maybe there were, I could have lost one.”

“Where?”

“Bring in the coat.”

Person 1 leaned back in his chair, it was surprising that Person 3 would even question Person 4.  They had always worked on the balance of trust, and while none of them truly trusted the others, they knew that if they weren’t honest they would destroy themselves.  There was little to no way that Person 4 had lied about it.  This was probably going to end badly.

“No.”

“No?”

“Why not?”

Person 2 asked this question not as an accusation towards Person 4, but simply as a question probing for more details.  His tone of voice had clearly stated that this shouldn’t be taken as an insult.

“I’ve altered it for my own use.”

“And?”

Person 3 was clearly using a tone of voice imply that Person 4 hadn’t actually killed the man in black.

“It would compromise this group for me to bring it in.”

They again sat in silence for several minutes.  There were two ways this could go, Person 1 knew this for sure, it would either destroy the group, or Person 3 would back off and things would return to normal.

“I… understand.”

It was a forced statement and it was obvious Person 3 wasn’t ready to let this go.

“I will send people to look into this new version of the man in black.”

There was the play that balanced out everything again.  Rarely did others go into the others area, but this was the olive branch to make up for not showing the coat.

“Thank you, I can accept that.”

“Any more business?”

Person 4 was clearly done with this meeting, and Person 1 didn’t feel like there was much more that could be discussed productively.  The outstanding issues from last time would have to be discussed the next time.  That was fairly common though, these meetings were only called when there was a need or event that demanded it.

“No.”

“No.”

“No.”

Person 1 stood up, he was the first to leave being he was the first to arrive.  He would leave, get in his car, and head out to the airport.  It was always tempting to stay around and see who everyone was, but that would again throw off the balance, and that was not worth it.  This balance had been held for eighty years, and he wasn’t about to throw it off now, not when everything was running so smoothly.  Besides the minor hiccups coming from the man in black, things had been perfect since the end of the war.  He walked out the door and closed the door behind him.  He walked over, got into his car and knocked on the window.

The car remained silent.

Knock, knock.

Person 1 got out and went to the drivers window.  The driver was dead in the front seat.  He pushed the driver out of the way and tried to start the car.  It sputtered but wouldn’t start.  After trying for two minutes he looked at his watch and headed down the street in the direction of the airport.  This was not good.  He made it a few steps away from the building.

Bang, bang.

Right now there were three men sitting down there, one in each corner.  They were waiting for the last of their group to arrive.  The basement door opened and the shadow of the last man appeared briefly before he came down the stairs.  His face was never illuminated by the light, and that was the point of having a single light.  None of the men knew who the others were besides by voice and silhouette.

“Evening.”

Grunts came back in response.  The men down here were not interested in small talk.

“Who called the meeting.”

“I did.”

The speaker coughed in the damp.

Cough, cough.

“I’ve heard that we might have an issue in New York City.”

“I’ve heard those rumors too.”

“The man in black?”

“Yes.”

There was silence in the room while each person was contemplating the outcomes that could be coming from the man in black.

“What has he done thus far?”

This was a carefully balanced question not said too quickly or too slowly, but in the way of someone feigning drawn out thought.  Person 1 had always suspected that Person 3 was from New York City, the accent didn’t place him as a local, even though how he arrived on time, he never knew.

“Not much, he apparently attacked a news reporter, but otherwise has been relatively quiet.”

There were grunts from all the corners again.  Person 1 had noticed that everyone in the group really liked to talk as little as possible.  With the distance between them they weren’t apt to run into each other, but anonymity was very important for them, he knew he wouldn’t like to be recognized by any of them out in the street.

“Any rumors as to what he wants?”

“No specifics, like normal, he kidnapped the reporter, didn’t speak a word, don’t know where he took her though, she was released quickly.”

“So no deaths this time?”

“Not yet anyways.”

Cough, cough.

Person 1 noted that the last of the group in hadn’t spoken yet.  It was a risk, but with himself and person 4 being quiet the others might grow suspicious.

“4, didn’t you say that the man in black would be stopped?”

There was silence in the room which was could have seemed creepy, but it was normal for there to be several minutes of silence.  Today wasn’t out of the ordinary all that much, they had discussed the man in black before.  The only time it had become heated was a year ago when the man in black had gone in a killing spree across eastern Europe, and person 4 had promised to stop the man in black.

“I did.”

Cough, cough.

“I have his jacket hanging in my study, I saw his dead body, if the man in black is back, it isn’t the same one.”

There was silence again, and Person 1 made a mental note of what Person 4 had said, not that he had killed the man in black, but that the man in blacks jacket was in Person 4′s study.  Person 1 couldn’t come up with a study he had seen a black jacket hanging in, but then again, he hadn’t seen the man in black in person, but it was useful information in case he ever needed to track down Person 4.

“One of my men saw this man in black in Europe before you took care of him, and he saw this one in New York City, he says it is the same man.”

“Not possible.”

Cough, cough.

Person 1 leaned back in silence, he wasn’t going to get involved in this.  Person 3 and Person 4 had gotten into arguments before, but it was mutually beneficial for everyone to work together.

Maverick sat back down in their booth rattling some change in his hand.

“Were you able to get a hold of the station?”

“Yeah, told Julia I had a family emergency.”

“She believe that lie?”

“No, but she’ll tell everyone else there and they’ll believe her.”

“Good.”

Ace finished off his beer.  Maverick and finished his before making the phone call.

“I got the next round.”

Maverick nodded, Ace looked over towards the bar, but his view was blocked by a man wearing a tan trench coat.

“No, I can get the next round.”

The man held up three fingers and the bartender nodded.  He sat down next to Ace in the booth.

“I can’t stay long, but I couldn’t help but overhear you two while you were at the Pentagon.”

“Did you know the General?”

“No, I did not know your General personally.”

“But he did work there?”

“No, he didn’t work there.”

“Then you know about lifeline?”

“No, I don’t know about this operation.”

“Then why are you talking to us?”

The bartender brought over three glasses of scotch and put them down on the table.

“Your tab?”

“Of course.”

The man in the trench coat took a sip from his scotch and smiled at them.

“I did know a person with the same last name as the General.  She told me her father had been in the war, rank of General.”

“You knew his daughter?”

“We talked once or twice, not much more.”

“Why not, did she go missing?”

“Missing, no, we didn’t work on projects together, and then she quit a year and a half ago, or go transferred somewhere else, I don’t know, I just talked to her in passing, that was it.”

“Then why did follow us to the bar?”

“Because we’re in Langley, outside the Pentagon, when someone comes asking questions, we listen.  Why exactly do you think she is missing?”

“Why should well tell you?”

“Because maybe I can fill in some missing pieces.”

Ace told the man in the brown trench coat what had happened and some of the information in the document that had been set them, leaving out details on the mole, and skipping the part about the man in black.  The man sat there listening without interrupting through the story, and slowly sipping on his scotch, he finally spoke when Ace was done with the story.

“I don’t suppose you have any of the document on you.”

Ace looked at Maverick who nodded.  Ace pulled a couple of pages out of his ruck sack and handed them to the man in the trench coat.

“Burned?”

“Accident.”

“I see.”

The man in the trench coat looked at them as if he could tell when people were lying.  Then he smiled and looked down at the document.

“Could be one helpful thing for you, if you tell me the whole story.”

“That was the whole…”

“How helpful?”

Maverick glared at Ace when Ace interrupted him.

“I don’t know, quite to very, I’d assume.  I won’t ask for much more to your story, just how this got burned.”

Ace and Maverick filled in some of the details as to how the pages got burned and how the man in black had shown up and kidnapped Julia.  The man in the trench coat nodded as he listened to the story.

“Did this man in black speak?”

“No, not to us or Julia.”

“I see.  Gentlemen, this document isn’t American.”

“What country is it from?”

“If I had to guess, I’d say Northern European, Russian probably, but it could be Scandinavian.  It is hard to tell now that it is burnt.  And I would guess your mysterious man in black is a foreign agent who doesn’t want to give himself away with his accent.”

The man in the trench coat finished his scotch and stood up.

“Is there anything else you can tell us about this?”

“Thank you for the drink gentlemen, and I’m afraid there is not.”

“What is your name, in case we find out more?”

“Oh, I’ll contact you if I want to, not the other way around.”

The man in the trench coat walked out of the bar.

“I have an idea.”

Ace got up from the table and went to the bartender and asked him a question quietly.

“What?”

Ace glanced at the door and then back at the bartender who repeated his answer.  Ace came back over and sat down across from Maverick.

“What did you ask?”

“I asked who we had a drink with, what was the name on the tab.  Bartender says the name on the tab is one “L Zoltan”.”

“You’re positive?”

“Julia handed me his death certificate, he was killed just after coming back in a car accident.”

“They were sure it was him?”

“The body had his license on it, and he was wearing his dog tags..”

“Hmm.”

“And his daughter identified him.”

“Okay, I believe you.  So if he’s been dead that long, why did we just get this now?”

“The package was postmarked two days ago, from in New York City.”

The barmaid came by with two more beers for them.

“I”m thinking we go on a road trip.”

“I can’t I work.”

“But the General gave us a mission, this is just like during the war, we obey.”

“I’ll see.”

The door opened to the bar and the man in black walked in.  The bar tender looked up at him and nodded.

“What can I get for you today?”

The man in black looked around and saw Maverick and Ace in the booth and started towards them.  Maverick hurriedly threw a couple of bills down on the table and Ace through the wires back into the rucksack.  The barmaid looked at them confused.

“Where is your back exit?”

The barmaid pointed to a pair of doors next to the bar that led into the back.

“But that isn’t for customer…”

“Thanks.”

Ace bolted through the doors with Maverick behind him.  The man in black looked around for a second as if he had lost them and then headed in the same direction that they had gone.  The door had swung closed behind them, but instead of stopping the man in black just hit the door with his shoulder knocking it off the hinges.  Ace and Maverick made it outside to Maverick’s car and they jumped in.

“Now you up for a road trip?”

“He’s probably a Langley spook.”

“Well, we can make it easy for him then.”

Maverick started up the car and hit the gas as the man in black rounded the corner of the bar.  He watched as they turned right down the next street and disappeared from his view.  He returned to the bar and went over to the booth.  Bending down he picked up as piece of wire that had fallen to the floor.

“One.”

He got back up and left the bar.

Maverick was looking around confused as Julia continued asking them questions.  Ace was busy snuffing any glowing embers in what was left of the papers.  Maverick felt the sudden need to sit down.

“Maverick, are you listening to me?”

His name caused Maverick to come back to reality.  Julia looked like she was about ready to panic.

“We don’t know anymore than you do.”

“Do you seriously expect me to believe that?”

“I’m telling you the truth…”

“Just get me back home, I just want to go home.”

“Alright.  Ace, are you okay?”

Ace was sitting on the floor spreading out the papers in front of him, the top half of the pile had a few scraps that weren’t at least somewhat burned, but the bottom of the pile had a few nearly whole pages left.  Ace was frantically trying to put them back in order in what looked like a jigsaw puzzle with some of the pieces missing.

“Yeah, I’ll be okay.”

“I’m taking Julia home.”

Ace looked up as they neared the door.

“Try and find the General tomorrow, I think we’ve lost most of it.”

“Will do.”

—-

The drive from Ace’s apartment to Julia’s took them half an hour.  During that time Julia didn’t seem to stop asking questions or telling Maverick the story of what had happened to her.  His adrenaline had also slowed down and he was about asleep by the time they made it to her place.  Maverick pulled his car into a parking spot in front of her apartment building and was ready to try and get a couple of hours of sleep before he would have to go into the television studio.

“Please, come up.”

Maverick snapped his head up after he had started nodding forward.

“What?”

“Come up, I can’t sleep if it is just myself in the apartment, not tonight, or I guess today.  And you shouldn’t try and drive home.”

“No, I couldn’t, it wouldn’t be proper.”

“I’m not suggesting anything improper, I’m suggesting you sleep on my couch.”

The clock on the car dash read 6:10.  Maverick nodded and got out of the car.  He walked around and held the door for Julia as she got out.  They headed into the apartment and got onto the lift.  Julia hit the button for the 84th floor.

—-

Maverick was working hard on his third cup of coffee for the day.  It had been a busy news day as Julia had managed to tell half of the make-up team about her adventure last night, and they had told the rest of the studio.  He had gotten little done in tracking down the General and even less done in his actual work.  He wasn’t all that concerned though, as even two of the producers for the news had come past his desk to hear the story, so they knew how swamped he was, and his workload had been cut down for the day.

It was nearing noon when Julia came by his cube.

“Have you had any luck?”

“Any luck at what?”

Maverick looked at Julia with a confused expression on his face as she sat down on his desk.

“Any luck tracking down your general.”

“No, nothing.  His package came from Langley, so I started there, but I’m not finding any record that he ever worked there at least not in the last few years.”

“I guess I’m a better reporter than you.”

“You found him?”

“Yup.”

“How, where?”

“I can tell you the exact section, row, and number of his headstone in Arlington Cemetery.”

“Where?”

The document could be called insightful at best, and impossible at worst.  The scientific mumbo-jumbo that had been thrown around at points hadn’t made sense even when they started and now any chance of understanding them had gone out the window.  Ace was still muttering parts of it in hopes that hearing it would help it make sense, but even he was giving up, and what he was saying made even less sense than the document that it had come from.

“I have to sleep at least a few hours before I go to the studio.”

“There’s a couch over there.”

Ace gestured to a couch that was covered with stacks of papers.  He started taking them off and stacking them on the floor in the same order as they had been on the couch.

“I need an actual bed, my bed.”

“Fine, come back when you are done with your job.”

“What about your job?”

“I’ll quit, this is more important than my job, otherwise the general wouldn’t have sent it to us.”

“What exactly is it?”

“I don’t know, I’m not an expert on this sciency stuff.”

“I’m going to bed.”

Maverick got up from the floor and grabbed his sports jacket from the back of a kitchen chair.  He had made it to the door when there was a knock.

“Who is it?”

Ace got up off the floor and headed towards the door.

“Is Maverick in there?  His landlord said that he might be.”

“What is it, Julia?”

Julia was a reporter that Maverick worked with at the station.  Her role was a bit more prominent though as she was an on air personality who had gotten her start during the war giving instructional’s on how save for the war time ahead.  Since the war she’d taken a larger role doing the weather broadcasts for the station and filling in for the head news anchor on several occasions when he was too drunk to go on television.  Julia was proud of this fact and aimed to take over his position after he made a fool of himself on TV yet again.  And if he did, she would probably increase viewership as he was an old, angry looking man, and she was younger and very easy on the eyes.

“We need you for a story down at the station.”

“Isn’t Tommy supposed to get the night shift stories?”

“Come on, we can at least have this conversation in person.”

Maverick opened the door and Julia was standing there looking upset.  Neither Maverick or Ace noticed the gun that was being held to her back until the masked man stepped out from behind the door frame.  He was dressed in a long black trench coat, his eyes were obscured by a fedora, and his mouth and nose covered with a black handkerchief.  He pressed the gun into Julia’s back, and she jumped, holding up a piece of of paper she read off it.

“Take all the paper’s and put them in a pile and burn them, or I will kill her.”

“Why would we do that?”

Ace had joined Maverick next to the door.  He was still holding a stack of the papers.  The man in black prodded Julia again.

“Take all the paper’s and put them in a pile and burn them, or I will kill her.”

“Ace, do it.”

“No, we don’t know what is going on here.”

“Ace, do it.”

“But what about the general’s daughter?”

“Ace.”

Maverick shouted and him.  Ace scowled and nodded his head.  He started grabbing the piles of paper and putting them in the middle of the floor.  Maverick grimaced as he saw Ace knock over a couple of stacks and fail to pick up pages that had fallen out of view of the door.  He kept on glancing back at the man in black and Julia, but the man didn’t seem to notice.  Finally all the papers were in a pile and Ace was standing over them with a book of matches.

“Let her go.”

The man in black shook his head.

“Let her come over to me, and we’ll light them, but not until she is over here.”

The man in black shook his head.

“If you don’t let her go, we won’t burn the pages, do you understand, both of us get what we want this way.”

Maverick was fuming and was about ready to take Julia by the arm and get her away from the man in black when he nodded his head.  He gave Julia a nudge with the gun and she scampered over to Maverick and stood behind him looking out with only her eyes and forehead showing.  Maverick nodded and Ace scowled and lit a match and dropped it onto the papers.

The papers caught quickly basking the room in a warm glow.  Maverick could sense that Ace was grimacing and mad about it, but on the outside, Ace was keeping a calm exterior.  The main black watched the papers burn for a minute until the flames had reached the edges of the bottom of the stack.  He nodded and turned away.  Maverick ran towards the door and closed it while Ace stomped out the burning pages.

“No thanks.”

“Fine, two for me.”

Maverick took a big sip from the beer and pushed aside a few of the papers.  He set the rucksack down on the table and opened it up.  There were two pistols sitting at the top of it, he took them out and set them down on the bench next to him so no one else could see them.  Keeping them low he turned them over, the initials M.I. were carved onto the handle of both of them.

“Why do you have the general’s old guns?”

“Who has what?”

“These, why did you have them?”

Maverick slid one of the guns across the table.  Ace picked it up and flipped it over and looked at it.

“Where did you get it?”

“From your rucksack.”

“From your rucksack?”

“No, yours, which was stolen, recognize it?”

Maverick turned the rucksack so Ace could see the initials stitched into the fabric.

“Where did you get my sack?”

“Some homeless guy, where did you get those guns, and those papers?”

“Those aren’t my guns.”

“And the papers?”

“Here, look for yourself.”

Ace handed Maverick the address from the package and a small stack of papers.

“That’s the start of it as far as I can tell, it was kind of in a mess.”

Maverick looked at the first page.  On the top it read “Confidential – Top Secret”.

“Where did you get this?”

But Ace had his head back down in his rucksack rummaging through what was left in there.  Maverick looked at the scrap of paper that Ace had handed him.  It didn’t have a name, but the return address was from Langley, Virginia, and the address was to the bar but it was addressed to Ace and himself.  Maverick turned back to the pages.

—-

In August 1943, the Allies discovered that the Nazis had been working on a mind control serum to use both on their enemies and their allies.  The Allies were able to determine that this neuro-agent , known by code name “lollypop” was being developed by Marzov Zoltan.

US Agents, codename, Lifeline, infiltrated the scientific base at an unkown location.  Before he could reveal the location, Lifeline was killed, but these documents contain all the information that Lifeline was able to smuggle out to the Allied troops in the area.  We know that the base was located somewhere near the German and Polish border.

—

Maverick looked up from his reading and at Ace who was skimming lines off of pages and putting them in stacks.

“Why did we get these?”

“I don’t know, but I almost have them all in order.  They are all about that scientist on page one, except for this one which was stuck in the middle.”

“What does that one say?”

“It is from the General, it doesn’t make all that much sense, it says that two people are missing from New York City, his daughter and her fiance, and he thinks that it is somehow connected to all of this.  What else is in my bag?”

“I haven’t looked yet.”

Maverick took the remaining items out of the sack.  There was a metal roll with little grooves and bumps on it, two pictures, a set of keys, and three wires, each of them twisted into an s shape.  There was a scrap of paper at the bottom.  On it was scrawled a brief note: “This will help you figure it out, I’m counting on you.”

“The general again.”

“What’s going on?”

“You know the rules.”

A barmaid interrupted the conversation.  Both Maverick and Ace looked at her confused and she pointed at the gun.

“Sorry.”

Maverick took it off the table and put it in the rucksack.  He took another drink of the beer.

“You can’t have that in here.”

“We’re leaving.”

Ace started putting all the papers back into a pile on the table and Maverick downed the last of one of the beers.  He looked at the other beer, but Ace already had everything back in the rucksack and was ready to leave.

Maverick honked the horn of his car impatiently.  He had just finished a long day of work and he knew that Ace Jones was waiting for him at the bar with a cold drink that he desperately needed.  The vehicle in front of him pulled through the stop sign and Maverick pulled ahead to wait his turn to cross the street.

New York City was busy at this time of the evening.  Everyone was getting off work and trying to hurry home to their family or hurry somewhere.  New York was always like that, but at rush hour it was enough to drive a patient man insane, and Maverick wasn’t all that patient to begin with.  He edged his car forward to try and get a better view.  He could see a little gap coming and he was going to take it.

Knock, knock.

A knock on his car window distracted Maverick and before he could hit the gas, the gap was past him.  He cursed under his breath.

Knock, knock.

There was another knock on the window.  He looked over to see a homeless man standing next to his car holding an old rucksack out in front of him.

“No, I don’t have any extra money.”

“This is for you.”

Maverick rolled down the window and looked at the homeless man.  The man pushed the rucksack towards him.  Maverick took the rucksack and began to open it.

“No, not here, wait.”

“What is it?”

The homeless man just shook his head and turned away from the car.

“Change, spare change, every penny helps.”

The car behind Maverick honked.  He set the rucksack down next to him and turned his attention back toward the street.  There was a lull in traffic.  Maverick stepped on the gas and sped through the intersection, behind him there was a honk as a vehicle had to slow down to avoid him.  He didn’t even notice as he looked down at the rucksack, it looked similar to the one that he had pushed away in the back of his closet.

Old military gear wasn’t all that impressive to the girls anymore, and it brought up a number of memories that he’d rather forget.  Immediately after the war Ace had put his old rucksack and helmet out on display so that every girl he got back to the place would know that Maverick had served in the army, but the charm of a war hero had faded on the girls as more and more soldiers returned home.  The rucksack and the helmet brought up too many old memories for Maverick, sometimes he still wondered why he hung out with Ace.

Maverick had done a good job for himself.  It wasn’t anything fancy, but it was involved enough to keep him busy and distracted.  Plus, he could say he worked in the news industry, even if it was with television.  Looking at him now, you wouldn’t have been able to tell that he was ever in the army besides his meeting up with Ace, no one would have known that he had been overseas in Germany.

Maverick looked down at the rucksack again, sown onto the back of the pack, very sloppily and surprisingly small were the letters ‘A’ and ‘J’.  It was Ace’s old rucksack.  Ace had made a big fuss about it four months earlier when after a night on the town and bringing some floozy home, he had woken the next morning to find his rucksack gone.  Ace looked at all his war memorabilia as his prize possessions, and where Maverick had moved forward with his life, Ace would have gladly still been living overseas, fighting the Nazis.

Maverick pulled over to the side of the road.  He glanced out to see the bar one building further down on the block, Ace’s shiny new car was sitting out front of it.  He grabbed the rucksack and threw it over his shoulder and headed towards the bar.  There was a mechanical scraping noise behind him, but Maverick paid it no attention, he was too curious about the rucksack and assumed it was most likely one of the new automated street sweepers.

He pushed open the bar door.  Sunlight followed him into the room.  A few regulars shielded their eyes to see who it was.  Maverick looked at Ace’s normal bar stool.  It was empty.  Maverick slowly scanned the room.

“Over here”

Ace waived from a dimly lit booth, there were pieces of paper strewn all over the table and there wasn’t a beer in sight.

Tick, tock.

Ace took a long pull from his pint glass and looked at the clock.  He had never heard it tick before, he assumed it must have since the hands moved, but then again, he normally wasn’t in the bar at 2, in the afternoon, on a Tuesday.

Tick, tock.

Ace had gotten bored at work, after fighting in the second World War having a normal job had sat with him well.  He had bounced around from construction, to factory work, to desk work, but the thrill and the emotion wasn’t the same.  The clock was moving slower than normal as Ace waited for his army buddy to show up.

Tick, tock.

“Another?”

Ace nodded and the bartender poured him another whiskey on the rocks.  He took a sip from it as he remembered all the trouble that he and Maverick had gotten into in the army.  They had been a very dangerous duo taking out more than their fair share of Axis troops, but with the amount of trouble they caused, they had better been the best.

Tick, tock.

The door opened to the bar letting the sunlight in.  Ace knew Maverick wouldn’t be here this early, but he shaded his eyes anyways to see who it was.  The blue uniform of the mailman gave him away.  He handed a couple of envelopes to the barman and then handed him a package.  He caught Ace’s eye and nodded as he left to continue his rounds.

Tick, tock.

“Bills, bills, bills, all he gives me every day is bills.”

“So big they’re coming in packages?”

Tick, tock.

“No, these two, once I open them I might need a drink too.”

The bartender laughed to himself like he had made a great joke and went into the back office to put the bills away.  Ace just shook his head.  The bartender came back with a knife to open the package.  He stopped short as he looked at the label.

Tick, tock.

“Ace, this one’s for you.”

Tick, tock.