A/N — … surprise, I'm still writing this! It's been about four months since my last update, so I figured I might as well get around to doing it ^^; I recently reread this story and decided, meh, even though I don't like where it's heading I still fancy the idea enough to continue writing about it, so we'll see how this thing turns out :P

Thanks for reading, and do review!

▒ What The Door Conceals ▒
by kaworu nagisa

Chapter Five – The Mary Sue Intruder

i.
Everyone takes the news better than I expected. I, too, for some reason, remain calm instead of going into a frenzy, which is what I would have expected myself to do. Out of all of us, Sherry is easily the most composed, her eyebrows drawing together in her usual serious mask. "We must take action immediately."

"Okay, so what can we do?" Jeremy tilts his head to one side.

"Step One," Alex voices; all our eyes dart to him instantly. "Stay calm. But since we've got that down; Step Two, find the Sue."

"Easier said than done, of course," Marm takes over smoothly. "Since this is obviously not an accidental venture in here, the Sue is here for something. We have to find out what that is and quickly protect it, as well as apprehend the Sue and escort her to the Rooms."

"But this is hardly a covert operation, is it?" Iris asks, wrinkling her nose. "They're not being really discreet, are they?"

"Yeah," Netishka echoes, "coming in through the front door and knocking a whole room of people unconscious isn't really being very subtle. It's like they're asking us to pay attention to them."

"There's something very wrong about this," Sherry says. Her eyebrows remain knitted, her lips pressed together so firmly they turn white. Her eyes flash to me. "Verity. Go find Victoria and Fletcher and bring them to up to speed. Everyone else, we'll start looking. Go to your respective departments — but tell no one what you're looking for. We don't want widespread panic."

Dem tilts her head. "Well, I don't think it really matters if you tell one person; get them to help you. Besides," she says, giving me a look, "There are some people who tell those people anyway."

I flush and look away, and uneasy laughter breaks out in the circle. "One person," Dem reaffirms. "One person you really, really trust."

"Got it," I say, and everyone, similarly, utters phrases of acknowledgement.

"Everyone, remember to wear your comunicuffs so we can stay in constant contact," Marm calls, raising her own wrist to reveal her comunicuff. I don't usually wear my comunicuff but I keep it with me at all times, so now I extract it from my pocket and slap it around my wrist. The screen flickers to life, spelling out two words: HEAD COMMAND.

"Shall we conduct a test?" Alex suggests, and one by one, all of us hit the "speak" button and say a single word, "test." Each time, the voices emanate from all our comunicuffs, indicating that the channel is working.

"Right. Marm, Dem, Alex, you know where to go. Vic'll know where to go too," she says to me. Sherry's gaze is hard, and she regards each of us in turn before nodding. "Good luck, everyone. Let's go."

ii.
I find Victoria and Fletcher in the Archives, up to their knees in books on Mary Sues, not a single word passing between them. Their only form of communication is a piece of paper they pass swiftly to each other — the same piece of paper I handed Fletcher the previous day regarding Nico di Angelo's dream. I feel slightly bad for interrupting them, but it has to be done.

"Ech-hem."

Both of them look like deer trapped in headlights as I emerge from behind a shelf and into the little alcove they're doing their research in. Victoria recovers first. "Yes, Verity?"

"I don't know if you've heard … but there's a bit of an emergency going on."

"A bit of an emergency?" Fletcher echoes in his usual silent tone.

"Yeah." I bite my lip. "There's … a Mary Sue loose in the CCC." Before I can complete my sentence, both of them react — Victoria stands up, slapping her comunicuff over her wrist, but Fletcher grabs her sleeve. "You can't," he says. "It's dangerous."

"It's my duty." Victoria attempts to shake him off, but he holds firm.

"Huh?" It's my turn to be confused. "What's going on?"

"If there's a Mary Sue here," Victoria says slowly, "it means the Sue army is coming. Which means … we have to get our defense ready."

"You don't know that," Fletcher argues, and then he stands too, drawing himself to his full height — one whole head taller than her. I've never heard him speak with such fervent passion before. "You don't know that the entire army is here. It could just be one person. Please, Vic." He adds. I blink; that's probably the most he's ever said in front of me: I don't know whether he's reasonably more chatty with Victoria, but it's still surprising to me. "Wait for the right time."

She won't look him in the eye. "Fine." Now she turns to look at me while Fletcher exhales in obvious relief. "What are Sherry's instructions?"

"Find the Sue," I relayed dutifully. "Fletcher, you're supposed to search the Archives; Victoria, she says you know where to go."

Fletcher nods, switching his comunicuff on, and Victoria straightens. "Yes, I do. I'll see you two later." She moves to walk past me, but I can't let her go without knowing. "Victoria … where, exactly, is that place?"

"The Dungeons," she says, and then she's gone.

iii.
I feel slightly apprehensive as I hurry across to the Care Centres, what with the knowledge that there is a Mary Sue loose in the CCC and that it's up to me and a few others to find her before it's too late. I already know who I'm going to tell — Cassiel. If anything, in times like these, I need his help and his support. Call me biased, but it's the sad truth — I have no one else to tell. He's my best friend.

I flash my pass at the scanner and burst through the front doors as though in a frenzy before I can remind myself to calm down. Calm down calm down calm down, I chant in my head as I force a smile at some passing Carers and check a screen on the opposite wall, which constantly morphs, relaying who is Caring for who at the current moment.

I all but erupt into Rory Williams' room, and hurriedly apologise for the intrusion before dragging Cassiel out of there.

"Whoah, whoah," Cassiel says, holding up his palms in front of me as though trying to ward me off. "Calm down before you speak." I'm out of breath, not because I'd been running, but more due to the panic that's coursing through my veins at this current moment.

"Cassiel," I gasp out, "there's a Mary Sue loose in the CCC and only Head Command and a few others know about it and I need your help to find her." I phrase it as best as I can. Thankfully no one passes through the corridor we're in, which could lead to disastrous results. Cassiel blinks.

"What on earth —?"

"I'm sorry I'm throwing this on you," I blurt, and then words come flooding out like literary vomit. "I'm sorry I'm always depending on you and dropping all these huge bombshells on you but I'm serious I have no idea what to do and I don't know what to think and I really, really, really just want to curl up in a ball and cry so —"

"Verity," Cassiel says, slowly. "I am not angry with you! Just calm down, compose yourself — of course I'll help you. How could you think otherwise, even for a moment?" He sounds slightly pissed that that train of thought would have passed through my mind, and I almost start crying in relief.

"Oh God," I say, wiping my half-watery eyes. "I don't deserve you. I really don't."

"Oh please," he says, with a dismissive roll of his eyes. "You deserve much better. Now," he says, gripping my hands tightly, "where do we start?"

"We're assigned to the Care Centres," I say. "I'll take Blocks A to C and you take Blocks D to F. We'll meet in Block G and then go through the rest together. We have to do this as quick as possible, but attract as little attention as possible."

"Got it." Cassiel says, squeezing my hands. "And stop being so silly." He drops a quick kiss on my forehead before heading off.

I shake the post-Cassiel daze that's threatening to come over me off and force myself to focus. All I need right now is for something like that to distract me, and that could mean the difference between life and death. I don't think the situation has ever been so dire.

I brace myself quickly before turning in the opposite direction.

iv.
Half an hour has gone by, and still nothing. I'm just passing through Hallway 11 in Block C when Sherry's voice speaks up from my comunicuff. "Anyone?"

"Nothing," Iris says.

"Nope," Jeremy responds. One by one the other members state that they've found nothing, either. I run the hallways through my mind, ensuring that I remember passing through each one. For some reason, I can't seem to recall checking Hallway 6 in Block B, but since I've covered both Hallways 5 and 7, I must have. I lift my wrist to my mouth to speak as well, but then my blood runs cold.

On my forearm is a single mark.

It could have been an accident, I know, so I turn around and head as swiftly as I can back to Block B, my heart palpitating. I remember setting course for Hallway 6, but the next thing I know, I'm in Hallway 7.

There's a second mark on my arm.

Now I start to panic, hitting the 'speak' button on my comunicuff and all but shouting, "Block B! Hallway 6! The Care Centres!" I'm near catatonic, I can't seem to catch my breath, and my heart is slamming so hard against my ribcage it's about to burst right out of my chest. I lean against a wall, choking as voices come flooding across the channel.

Out of all of them, Sherry's rings the clearest. "Verity! Verity, are you sure?"

"No," I manage.

She sounds dissatisfied. "Did you see her with your own eyes? What was she doing? What did she do to you? Did you make contact with her?"

"I don't know," I say, going into a full-scale nervous breakdown. I never thought that I would in my life encounter them — I've been told how to react when I see them, but that doesn't stop me from being wholly, utterly, terrified. "I don't know. I don't know anything. I don't know."

Victoria now, her voice serious and utterly grim. "Then how do you know she's there?"

"Tally marks," I get out. "Tally marks on my arm." Gasps from all the other members of Head Command, including Jeremy going, "shit."

I can't breathe anymore. "She's allied herself with the Silence."

v.
The first to find me is Cassiel, which makes the most sense, because he's the nearest to me. I don't know how he knew, seeing as we had no means of communication, but he must have come looking for me. By the time he arrives and pulls me into a tight hug on seeing my catatonic state, there are seven marks on my arm. After that, it doesn't take much time for the others to arrive at Hallway 7.

When Pads, the last member of Head Command to arrive, steps into the hallway, there are eight marks on my arm and one on everybody else's.

"We can't fight the Silence without eyedrives," Netishka speaks up, and that's the only thing we can agree on. Everybody else has varying views on how we should tackle the situation — I think we should stay as far away as possible, Jeremy thinks we should just fight them, Sherry thinks we should fall back and strategise, so on and so forth.

There are a few other faces here too, the select few that other members of Head Command have chosen to confide in — Jessica's deputy, Jay Parker, is here; he shifts uncomfortably in the background, obviously out of place, and also present is Alli, which I am quite happy to see. Not only because she's my friend, but also because this means she and Jeremy are getting closer, and in these dark times I'm glad they both have someone to confide in. Asides from them, I also see Joan Markham, an Experimenter friend of Pads and the most surprising of all, Mara White.

Like I've said, Mara White is mostly a mystery — all we know about her is that she's one of our three founders, along with Victoria and Sherry, and that she heads the Training Centre, located off the main compound. What they do is no secret, but we've never seen it in action — nor Mara, for that matter. The fact that Mara is here makes it even more serious — Sherry and Victoria wouldn't have called her here if the situation wasn't at its most dire.

"Sherry," Victoria says, "are we in stock of eyedrives?"

For the first time since she materialized soundlessly behind me in her black ensemble, Mara White speaks up. Her voice is low-pitched and without the faintest hint of a smile in it, like Victoria's. "I can dispatch some of my best at a moment's notice."

"I think that would be the best idea," agrees Victoria. She, Sherry and Mara all share a glance. The rest of us fall silent, holding our breaths, not daring to interrupt a conversation between our three heads. My eyes remain on Mara White; I can't even see her entire face behind the black handkerchief tied around her nose and mouth, but I can see her dark hair spilling over the nape of her neck, see the crease between her dark eyes. For some reason, despite the fact I don't know anything about her, she seems to be the most formidable person I've encountered in a long time.

"Wait," says Alex, holding up a hand. "So, what do the rest of us do? Wait it out?"

"We refuse," says Jeremy stubbornly, and the entire circle nods in agreement.

Sherry looks pained. "Everyone, please — for one, we're not warriors. We're not trained. We can't hold out against the Silence — while others might, we definitely cannot."

"But there has to be something we can do," argues Iris. "Do you really expect all of us to remain calm and sit obediently in a corner while others are risking their lives on the front line, for the same cause as we have? We're supposed to be Head Command, Sherry. We can't just —"

"Yeah, we can't just sit around —"

"We're not going to —"

"You can't make us —" Soon everybody is agreeing and chiming in; the only silent one is Fletcher, who just stands there with his eyes on Victoria, obviously watching for her response. I watch the two of them silently argue, until Victoria sighs and turns away to the protesting others.

"Enough," says Mara White. Everybody falls silent at once, and Mara looks to Victoria, who takes over swiftly.

"I'm sorry you all feel this way. But as Sherry has pointed out, we're not trained. Even if we tried, we'd probably just be a liability to Mara and her soldiers." Hearing it from Victoria's mouth makes it more official; we're definitely not going to be able to help anymore. "But we're going to need your help in other areas. Make sure no word of this gets out anywhere. Verity," her gaze drops to me, "you're going to have to reschedule everything. Make sure none of your Carers come near this block. The rest of you, help coordinate the movement of the Canons from this block. Besides," Victoria says, a wry smile quirking the corner of her mouth, "you're going to have your hands full, too. Moving everyone out yet making sure no one panics? That's a pretty tall order."

Some people laugh. Others remain pensive in thought.

Mara White claps her hands once, and almost instantaneously three others, clothed similarly in black, flank her. Their appearance is so startling some of us almost fall over, but she doesn't seem perturbed in the least. "These are my lieutenants — Jennifer, Fannie, and Sylvester." She indicates each of them in turn; Fannie is the only one to wave. "They'll be sealing off this corridor in preparation for our operation. Alright," she says, now addressing the group. "You know who we're up against — the Silence and a Mary Sue. You know the protocol for dealing with the Silence — you see them, you make a tally mark on your arm, you know you've seen them. The Mary Sue — we have no idea. We don't know what powers she has."

"Speaking of which, we'll probably equip each of you with an eyedrive," Sherry says with a slight frown. "It's likely to cause some confusion and perhaps even some questions, but most won't know what they're for. Just say it's some new virtual system Head Command is trying out."

I don't understand how we can be standing here discussing this so calmly while the Silence and one of the most dangerous beings in the entire of FF·net is in the next corridor. Right now, the only things keeping me sane are Cassiel's arm on my elbow and the fact that I'm in familiar territory — Care Centre B. But the fact that this is so close to home just terrifies me further.

"For now, you are dismissed." Sherry says. "Return to your schedules. Go on with your lives." Her eyes meet Victoria's and Mara's. "But be on standby for further orders."

There isn't really anything more that can be said.

vi.
The eyedrives come the next day. They're slightly uncomfortable, pieces of unknown material that meld to your eye and sink into the contours of your eye socket — I wouldn't mind it so much if not for the fact that being blind in one eye throws me off balance and disrupts my perception.

Shifting everyone out of Block B is driving me nuts — we have about two thousand Canons, give or take, in that block alone. The block itself doesn't seem that large; we've extended it to about fifty times its apparent size with Undetectable Extension Charms. Furthermore, I'm doing it with only one usable eye. Naturally, that doesn't contribute in any way to the difficulties I've been having, but between the eyedrives and my overwork, I'm going mad.

I turn the corner and for the billionth time, crash into someone, sending my paperwork flying all over the place. "Sorry," I exhale exasperatedly, and drop to my knees instantly, crawling around in trying to retrieve everything.

"No problem," says the Carer I bumped into. I blink.

"Alexa? You've been discharged?"

"Yeah," she says with a bright smile. My eyes widen further, and I clutch at her arms. "Do you remember anything? What happened? What does she look like? What kind of powers did she use against you?"

"Hey, calm down," Alexa laughs, but her expression turns serious. "I remember … vaguely. It's like I was drunk or something — like I wasn't in my right mind? But I remember everything that happened. One minute I was turning in some paperwork … and then I heard a voice. A voice which seemed to entrance me, and before I knew it I was following that voice, heavily intoxicated, all the way to the reception office."

Here she takes a deep breath. "And there I saw the most beautiful girl I had ever seen in my life. Pale blond hair, skin as white as snow, eyes like limpid tears …" I pinch her at this point, and her vision clears. "Sorry," she says embarrassedly. "It's kind of the aftereffect. Anyway, I saw that girl, and I knew I had to talk to her, get to know her, be her best friend. So I started trying, but there were about twenty others also trying to talk to her, and we started fighting — and then nothing." In accordance with Jolyn's story, at this point in time, the girl screamed, and everyone passed out. I take a deep breath, thank Alexa, and move on.

The powers of the Sues are greater than I thought. To be able to hypnotise people like that … it would be invaluable in the war. God, I think, help us. Turns out we're even more screwed than before.

At that moment, my comunicuff crackles to life, and in a flash it's by my lips; my voice mingles with the nine other people all shouting, "what what what" down the channel. Sherry clears her throat, and my heart soars.

"We have her," Sherry says. "The Sue."

A/N — this is a short update, expect the next chapter sometime soon! again, do review (: