Betrayed...but by who

[Animegurl5]

"I'd say we were pretty lucky indeed that guy knew you." Skylar crossed her arms. "So Cap, what you want me to do?" She didn't take her eyes off of Izzy, who was currently her only threat at the moment.

[Lady Jenn]

"Lower the gun Petra, she's not a threat," he said, an order Petra followed reluctantly. "You found something out about what happened to Muri didn't you? That's why you were so keen to get him out of that party."

"How did you guess it wasn't his birthday?" Keeley said. "I managed to trick him into thinking it after all."

"My guess is Yuchi thinks this was an early birthday party right?" he asked Yuchi who nodded. "I read every page of his file before we came out here, Yuchi's birthday isn't for another month yet. What happened to Muri?"

"Yuchi," Izzy said, turning to him. "I'm sorry I lied to you but we've both lost siblings to these scum. If you want to go back and warn them about what's happening I won't stop you, but we can bring them down together."

"I need to know what happened," Yuchi said. "And you four are the only ones offering to tell me the truth."

"Well, I guess I'd better start from the beginning then," Izzy said as she sat down on the sofa.

[Animegurl5]

"But why trust us to go with you? If you found something out as important as that, why trust complete strangers?" Skylar asked leaning against a nearby wall. "Sorry if I find that a little hard to believe at the moment."

((Ohmigawd, my posting is having some serious issues right know. Sorry.))

[Lady Jenn]

"There's a reason Tom picked you for me to speak to wasn't there?" Morrison asked. "That ring around your neck, Tom has an almost identical one. You and him are ex's aren't you?"

"Good old Major Tom," Izzy said with a laugh, finally lowering her gun. "The reason I trust you three is the first line Rick here came out with when he walked up to me was a chat-up line so unbelievably cheesy I'd only heard it from one other person. Only Tom would tell someone to try and grab my attention by comparing me to Elektra from the Daredevil comics. I spose I should be flattered he still thinks I'd be a good ally after all this time."

[Animegurl5]

"I can not believe you would actually take advice like that. What is wrong with you?" Skylar rolled her eyes and rested her face in her palm. "Honestly, it's a good code but only when you know it's code... Please promise me you won't ever say anything like that for real. Anyways, as far as I have understood our discussion so far, you have a story for us?"

[Lady Jenn]

"As far as Alexey and co. are concerned I spend my days checking their finances," she said as they all sat down. "Which is true...to a point. But when you're a member of the Inner Circle you get access to files no-one else within Firebrand would even be told exist. For a while the Inner Circle was only infiltrating the US political system but evidently the current president isn't listening to them. They have the ear of the French, Russian and Italian Prime Ministers and I get the feeling the only reason they haven't got anyone in China is the difficulty of getting spies into the country without anyone noticing. Which didn't seem that strange, until I discovered what Muri had been looking at before he disappeared." She took out a smartphone she had taken a photo of her computer monitor on. On it, in large lettering, was the words 'Project Shadowdancer'. "I would've bought the file with me but if I'd printed it off they'd have got suspicious."

[Animegurl5]

"Tom mentioned something about Shadowdancer... And you think they got him because they found out what he was looking at? That would explain Muri's disappearance but what about your sister's? Do you think she might have found the same file? I really want to get my hands on that file now..." It was then that her stomach growled in protest of the untouched food. "Does anybody mind if I start on that?" She added with a sheepish grin.

[Lady Jenn]

"Feel free, I won't stop you," Izzy said with a smile. "As for the file that's almost certain, but unless we can get into that file we can't be 100% sure."

"But how do we get into it?" Yuchi asked. "Carlo designed their firewalls, the only way to access their files is from within the HQ itself."

"We're lucky," Izzy replied. "This is where you three can come in handy, if we can...'distract' any of the Inner Circle who might otherwise keep an eye on the computers then we can be busy retrieving the files we want. We can always say you're looking to invest in the company and wanted to take a look around before making your decision."

[Animegurl5]

"Thanks." She sat down and cut herself a slice of the cake, consuming it swiftly but politely. With a content smile she began to let the words sink into her brain.  "Ooh, sounds like fun. I've always wanted to be someone's decoy." She responded skeptically and sarcastically.

[Lady Jenn]

"Its our only option," Izzy replied. "You need a login to access the computers which only me and Yuchi possess out of us five and if any of you were caught using one of the computers your cover would be blown."

"Either way we'll have to go in the morning," Morisson said. "If we turn up now its going to look a bit fishy. I don't mind sleeping on the sofa, the rest of you can sort out the sleeping arrangements."

"There's another complication," Izzy said. "Admittedly it only affects Morrison. You've not seen the guy in five years so I don't blame you for not recognising his codename. How many people do you know have the codename Firebrand?" she asked, handing him a file. "This is the head of the Inner Circle, the guy we got you out of the party to avoid."

"Oh hell," Morrison said as he read the file. "Tom Linklater," he said, showing the photo of a man who looked not much older than Morrison. "Ex-Navy SEAL, we were teammates up until five years ago when...officially...he was declared MIA during a mission to rescue US hostages. If he sees me it'll take him five seconds to figure out who we are and why we're there."

[Animegurl5]

"Wonderful, an Ex-Navy Seal that will recognize you the moment you walk into a room. That leaves only us two with the ability to walk in there safely... Or so to speak." She rolled her eyes in frustration. Then looking to Petra she smiled. "Now I'm kind of glad I refused the gun, to think that we could have been caught by that dude while carrying weapons? Probably would have ended up dead immediately." Then turning back to Izzy she directed her question to the two guests. "So what do we do about it?"

[Lady Jenn]

"Well, by luck, Linklater is rarely in the office," Izzy said. "He's one of three members of the Circle who are almost never seen, I don't even know the aliases of the other two. I can phone ahead in the morning though to check if he's there."

"And if he is?" Morrison asked.

"Well, if he is we can't risk you going in there," Izzy replied. "All that needs to change is how many people go in. Tom will have made sure you have plenty of money available so they should buy the investor cover." She smiled slightly at Morrison and Petra's looks of surprise. "Tom has been fighting these guys for ages, he knows how they work. Besides, its not THAT long ago me and him went our seperate ways but...that's a conversation I'm not having with any guys," she said. "If Petra and Skylar REALLY want to know I'll happily tell them though."

[Animegurl5]

"Yo Petra.... Remind me to ask about the scoop later. I'll want to hear about that one." She laughed and took another slice of cake, which also disappeared quickly. And then a third made it to her plate. "Wow this stuff is good.... Now, for our game plan. How do we want this to play out?"

[Lady Jenn]

"We can't risk both of us checking the files," Yuchi said. "If Petra and Skylar get in trouble they'll need one or other of us there to make sure they're safe."

"Agreed," Izzy said. "I'll show them round, you know your way round a computer better than I do and you've got more excuse to be checking the files than I have. We can't go in armed though," she said. "The entrances are covered in metal detectors, you carry so much as a knife they'll be alerted."

"Which means you guys have no protection if this operation goes tits up," Morrison said.

"No," Izzy said, putting her feet up. "But unlike you guys I was trained to get out of this kind of situation when I don't have a machinegun to hand. Stick with me and we'll be fine."

[Animegurl5]

"Hand-to-hand combat... I can do that. I can do that well." She smiled, looking over at Morrison. "You aren't worried about us are you? Your lack of confidence in us is rather insulting." Her voice was accusing but her eyes were filled with a mischievous intent. "Too bad on the knife though, I love my knife." She added as an after thought.

[Lady Jenn]

"Bear in mind we lost an entire team to a bomb when we were heavily armed," Morrison said.

"Yeah, but you're on American soil," Izzy replied. "Even if they figured out who you were they couldn't risk doing anything that might draw attention from anyone like the police. There are a whole lot of things in that building they don't want the feds to find out about."

"We should get some sleep," Morrison said. "I don't know about you four but I'm exhausted and we'll need to be fully attentive if we're going to get in and out without anyone getting suspicious. At least since they saw us at the party they might be a little less trigger happy than if we were complete strangers turning up."

[Animegurl5]

"Yeah, that is always a plus. But less trigger happy does not mean not trigger happy. Ugh, I'm beat! All that cake is making me drowsy." And almost on cue she opened her mouth in a wide yawn, though she remembered to cover it quickly. "I call part of the bed." And then without even a moments hesitation, she plopped down on the edge of the bed with her face down in the pillow. She was out before the rebound.

[Lady Jenn]

Petra and Izzy ended up lying on the bed with her, Yuchi curling up in one of the chairs and falling asleep with his head resting on the cushion. The next morning Morrison was the first one up, ordering breakfast for the others but deciding not to disturb them and just wait for the others to wake up first. Izzy appeared, a dressing gown pulled tightly around her, smiling slightly at Morrison blushing slightly.

"Some idiot left there's behind," she said. "Luckily its a perfect fit for me."

[Animegurl5]

Skylar was the third one up, only a few minutes after Izzy. Growling as she dragged herself to the other room, she realized she was stil in the dress from the previous evening and her hair was sticking out in mulitiple directions. She didn't care, not even with the full knowledge that her make-up was smudged quite unattractively about her face. "Did you order food yet?" Her voice was thick with sleep, her eyes still half closed as she trudged towards the two.

[Lady Jenn]

"Morrison has," Izzy said. "If you don't like the food blame him," she said with a laugh. She vanished to the bathroom before returning grinning."Good news, apparentely our friend Firebrand is on holiday for the next two weeks so you can come along with us Morrison, assuming you can handle going around with three glamorous young women?" She smiled at him trying to hide his cheeks turning red. "Is there anything we need to pick up before we get there?"

[Animegurl5]

"Food is food, if it's edible I'll eat it." She made her way to a chair in which she sunk into comfortably. "Oh goody, one less crazy man to deal with." Her words were muffled by her ungraceful yawn and she stretched out her tight muscles.

[Lady Jenn]

"There is a way we can rouse less suspicion," Izzy said. "They're going to guess we spent the night together somewhere so if we acted like we were couples it might distract them a bit more."

"Yeah, but if Yuchi is sorting the computers out that means we have three girls and one guy," Morrison said.

"Wow, you're pretty unobservant, even for a guy," Petra said as she emerged from the bedroom. "As cute as you and Yuchi are you aren't really Izzy's type, if you catch my drift."

"The Circle know I prefer girls," Izzy said. "They'll buy me turning up with Petra more than turning up with you. Besides, lets face it, you and Skylar make far too cute a couple for me to come between."

[Animegurl5]

At Izzy's words, Skylar flipped out of her chair and landed face down on the floor. "oooow" The sound was quite muffled and she was too lazy to move and so she just turned her head to try and look at Izzy. "Thank you for the input Izzy. I appreciate you sharing that tid bit of information with us, now shut up."

[Lady Jenn]

"I...I should go pay for the hotel room," Morrison said, trying to avoid anyone seeing how hurt he looked at Skylar's comment as he vanished out of the room.

"Leave it to me," Izzy said. "Its my fault he's upset. We'll meet you in the car park."

"I was only teasing him about you," Petra said, sighing as she sat in one of the chairs. "I think he genuinely likes you and he probably feels like you just said 'thanks but no thanks' I'm guessing. She's right though, you and Morrison look like a better couple than me and him do, if I'm being honest I'm a bit jealous."

[Animegurl5]

Pushing herself up to a standing position she looked at Petra kind of guiltily. "I can see that now. But if I am to be honest with you, I think that will be kind of akward in more ways than one. I will aplogize to him once we are under safer circumstances but to have him acting like this during a mission is.... I screwed up didn't I?" She sighed dragging herself to the table. "Bah, there is nothing to be jealous of so I don't know why you should be."