"Ow! Ow! Careful!" I exclaimed, letting out a slight hiss of pain, as the medic tediously tended to the scraps on my hands, arms, and even my cheek.

The punch to the stomach had knocked me senseless, so when the kick came, I wasn't able to block it. That punch, it had felt like I'd been hit with a sledgehammer, minus the broken bones.  When I came to, I found a medic leaning over me, checking to see if I was alright.

As the medic finished up and left me alone, I got to my feet and weaved my way through the crowd of medical and few police officers till I located Marisa.

"You look like hell." And she did. She looked as if she had gotten the short end of the straw. Her left arm was bandaged up and she had a huge bruise on her cheek. There was even an egg-sized lump on the side of her head.

She gave me a look, narrowing her eyes slightly, before replying,  "Geez, aren't you a ray of sunshine. That's the second time you've said that to me. Got anything better?"

"Sorry. How are you feeling?" I asked, taking a seat beside her.

"Like shit. What happened? My memories are a little fuzzy."

I pressed my lips into a thin line as I thought back to all that had happened before I blacked out, " Right before you could stab the mutant, there was an explosion. That guy from the lab showed up. He had a friend."

"Seriously? Please tell me you were able to repay him for our last run in." 

 "No. Before I could even move, our 'friend' appeared in front of me and knocked me out."

Marisa let out a soft curse, shaking her head. Looking around, she frowned before asking, "Where's the mutant?"

"Gone. There's no sign of it. I'm assuming those two took it with them, though, where to, I have no idea."

"All that work we did to bring him down.....Damn. I feel as if I just helped the enemy now."

She wasn't the only one. We made it easier for them. I shook my head, wishing I could rid myself of this awful feeling. It was a feeling that left an awful taste in my mouth.

Looking up, I nudged Marisa, "Looks like Dare sent Chief Johnson. He's heading this way."

"Oh great! And I look as if I'd been tossed around like a ragdoll." Marisa said, sarcasm lacing her tone. I choose to ignore her snarky remark and got to my feet as Johnson walked over to us.

"Natasha. Marisa. How are you two feeling?" He asked in way of greeting.

"We've been better sir. " I replied.

He looked us both up and down, taking in our appearance, before speaking to us, demanding to know what exactly happened here.

We exchanged a look, before Marisa spoke up, "I came here to check on Natasha, to see if she was feeling ok. While we were talking, some sort of commotion broke out, causing us to come see what was happening. We discovered a mutant terrorizing the people."

"A mutant? And what happened to the mutant?"

I took over speaking, "I don't know, sir. We were so close to taking it down, but..... Outside forces showed up. I was knocked out. When we both came to, the mutant was gone."

Chief Johnson seemed to notice how I said 'outside forces' and nodded. Divulging the full extent of what happened was something I wanted to wait till we were back at Project Shadow, and away from both prying eyes and prying ears.

"Alright. Well, Dare will want to hear everything that happened here. For now, there's nothing more you can do here. You should go home and get some much needed rest." Johnson suggested.

"No way! I need to stay here! Help find anything that you guys might miss!" Marisa exclaimed.

Johnson gave her a very hard, stern look at her words, "You have three bruised ribs! You will go home and get some rest! I don't need you doing something reckless and making you're injuries worse!"

Marisa almost flinched at the harsh tone Johnson used on her, but it was understandable. Marisa was known for her recklessness at times, as well as her tendency to be a beast when it came to fine point detail. And things got a lot worse when her temper flared up.  And with bruised ribs, chances were, Johnson was right. She'd just end up making her ribs worse.

"Don't worry sir, I'll make sure she gets home and rests" I declare, grabbing a hold of Marisa's wrist and tugging her behind me as I hurried past police and medics, retracing our steps back to the bakery parking lot where our vehicles sat waiting.

Marisa pulled herself free of my grasp and stepped back, "I don't need you tugging me around everywhere. You know I can walk on my own, right?"

Letting out a sigh, I turn to face her, "Of course, but I also know just how stubborn you can be. You would of fought Chief Johnson, just to stay back!"

"Of course!  What if there is something those baffoons of police over look something?" 

"They won't over look anything. Johnson will make sure of that. Have a bit more faith and trust him." I say. I understood that what I was suggesting was hard for her to do. Marisa had a hard time trusting most people. At least to an extent. She had a rough childhood. Was used and abused, and by the people who were suppose to take care of her. Trust didn't come easy for Marisa. You had to work hard to earn it.

Pressing her lips together, she seemed to be thinking my words over, before finally giving in, "Fine. You don't need to babysit me either, so you can get that out of your head."

 "Alright. I understand. I'll see you in the morning then."

"Yeah. Night."

We parted ways, going to our respective vehicles and heading home.

-

A groan issued forth as I slowly woke, the sound of ringing echoing in my ears. Slowly, I cracked one eye open, squinting and blinking a few times as I slowly adjusted to the brightness of the sun shining through my bedroom window. As the ringing started up again, I let out another groan, finally rolling onto my back. Reaching over, I fumbled around on my nightstand, before finally locating my cellphone.

"Hello?" I answered, my voice slightly husky from sleep.

"'Tasha! You awake? Good. Have you seen the news?!"

I pulled the phone back a little as my sister's voice came through, loud and clear. Emphasism on the loud part. "Sarah, I just woke up, so no, I haven't seen the news." I replied, slowly sitting up.

"What? It's ten in the morning! Why are you still in bed?" She demanded.. sighing, I massaged the space between my eyes as I replied, "I had a rough night, so I didn't get much sleep."

"Oh. More nightmares huh? Sorry sis...... anyway, you have to check out the news!"

Better to let her believe my lack of sleep was due to my nightmares rather then what actually happened. Besides, it wasn't that far fetched. God knows I had tons of nightmares that have robbed me of my sleep.

"Alright. Alright. I'm walking to the living room now." I said as I padded my bare feet from my bedroom and into the living room. Grabbing the remote, I turned on the t.v. and flipped through the channels till I found one of the news channels.

The news was talking about what happened last night. Even showing glimpses of the street with the wrecked car and missing fire hydrant. They talked about how anyone in a five mile radius could hear this awful yelling or something like that, that could practically raise the dead.

Then at the end of all that talk, they blamed all that damage, noise included, on a gas leak, using the fire hydrant as proof.

Seriously?

They couldn't come up with a better excuse then that? I swear, the whole gas leak cover story has been over used. 

Switching the t.v off, I spoke into the phone, "So, there was no major gas leak last night. I don't see what the big deal is."

"Don't you see? That's just it! I don't think there was a gas leak last night! That story  the news is feeding us, I don't buy it. It's filled with so many holes, you might as well slice it up and make a cheese sandwich out of it!" Sarah exclaimed, "The journalist in me tells me there's more to this, and I intend to find out!"

Ah, so that was why she was do excited. She thought that she had a story here.

Even though Project Shadow was really good at covering it's tracks and basically keeping the public in a need-to-know basis, I still couldn't help but worry. My sister was relentless when she thought she was onto to something. Like a dog a with a bone. She wouldn't stop until she was sure she had uncovered the truth.

A good trait to have if you were considering journalism as a career, but a rather scary trait since I was an agent. I could only hope she didn't discover anything leading back to Project Shadow.

"Whatever you say, Sarah. I need to get dressed and head out. I have some errands to run, but keep me posted." 

"Will do! You'll be the first to know if and when I find anything out!" Came the reply.

Saying our goodbyes, I hung up before grabbing some clothes from my closet and getting dressed. I had a couple of bruises to go along with the cuts and scraps from last night, plus, I felt both Dore and stiff.

I wasn't completely lieing to my sister when I told her I had errands to run. They'd just have to wait till after I checked in at Project Shadow and gave my full report.